Weston Composite Server 13.0 Released with OpenGL Rendering

After half a year of development, the Weston project proudly announces the release of version 13.0 of its Wayland composite Server. This milestone introduces features and enhancements that solidify Weston’s commitment to providing a robust foundation for Wayland protocol integration across popular desktop environments like GNOME, KDE, and diverse embedded solutions for automotive infotainment systems, smartphones, TVs, and other consumer devices.

The significant version bump to 13.0 is accompanied by crucial changes that may break compatibility but are poised to redefine the user experience and development possibilities. Among the notable updates are:

1. Multiple Backends Loading: A major breakthrough in Weston 13.0 is the capability to load multiple backends simultaneously. This includes the main output backend along with secondary backends like VNC, RDP, and PipeWire.
2. OpenGL Rendering Support: Weston 13.0 introduces OpenGL rendering support for backend-vnc, backend-pipewire, and backend-rdp, enhancing the graphical capabilities across these backends.
3. Improved Kiosk-shell for Internet Kiosks: The kiosk-shell sees improvements in full-screen mode operations, with added support for creating full-screen surfaces for applications launched via XWayland.
4. Overlapping Output Support: Weston 13.0 introduces support for overlapping output, allowing seamless placement of elements on planes across multiple output devices, contributing to a more dynamic user interface.
5. Enhanced Pointer Movement Control: The desktop-shell now implements the ability to limit the area of pointer movement on full-screen surfaces, providing more control and precision.

Under the hood, Weston 13.0 introduces several technical improvements:

1. Library Version Update: The DRM-backend and various clients no longer support libgbm library versions earlier than 21.1.1, ensuring compatibility with the latest technologies.
2. New Functions: Weston 13.0 adds several new functions, including weston_view_move_to_layer(), weston_log_scopes_iterate(), and updates to existing functions like weston_view_set_position, weston_touch, and weston_output, utilizing the weston_coord structure for improved efficiency.
3. Component Changes: The launcher-logind component has been replaced by launcher-libseat, aligning with modern practices and supporting systemd-logind.

Closing Notes

There are very few open-source Wayland compositors available. This release is well put up with features and upgrades. The multi-backend support opens doors for diverse application scenarios while improved rendering capabilities enhance graphical performance. The refined kiosk shell and overlapping output support cater to unique use cases, providing a versatile platform for desktop and embedded environments.

You can download the source in GitLab. This version is yet to arrive in Debian, Ubuntu & Arch repos as of publishing this report; however, it will be packaged soon.

Via release notes

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