Ubuntu Manpage: weston - the reference Wayland server

NAME

       weston - the reference Wayland server

SYNOPSIS

       weston

DESCRIPTION

       weston  is  the  reference  implementation  of  a Wayland server. A Wayland server is a display server, a
       window manager, and a compositor all in one. Weston has several backends as loadable modules: it can  run
       on Linux KMS (kernel modesetting via DRM), as an X client, or inside another Wayland server instance.

       Weston supports fundamentally different graphical user interface paradigms via shell plugins. Two plugins
       are provided: the desktop shell, and the kiosk shell.

       Weston also supports X clients via Xwayland, see below.

BACKENDS

       drm    The  DRM  backend  uses  Linux  KMS  for output and evdev devices for input.  It supports multiple
              monitors in a unified desktop with DPMS. See weston-drm(7), if installed.

       wayland
              The Wayland backend runs on another Wayland server, a  different  Weston  instance,  for  example.
              Weston shows up as a single desktop window on the parent server.

       x11    The  X11  backend runs on an X server. Each Weston output becomes an X window. This is a cheap way
              to test multi-monitor support of a Wayland shell, desktop, or applications.

       rdp    The RDP backend runs in memory without the need of graphical hardware. Access to  the  desktop  is
              done  by  using the RDP protocol. Each connecting client has its own seat making it a cheap way to
              test multi-seat support. See weston-rdp(7), if installed.

       vnc    The VNC backend runs in memory without the need of graphical hardware. Access to  the  desktop  is
              done  by  using  the  RFB protocol. Currently only one connecting client is supported. See weston-
              vnc(7), if installed.

       pipewire
              The PipeWire backend runs in memory without the need of graphical hardware and creates a  PipeWire
              node  for  each  output.  It  can  be  used  to capture Weston outputs for processing with another
              application.

SHELLS

       Weston's user interface is implemented by individual 'shell' plugins.  A number of  shells  are  provided
       for different usecases.

       desktop
              The  desktop shell is Weston's default mode. It provides an example of a desktop-like environment,
              featuring a panel with launchers and a clock, a background,  and  an  interactive  task  switcher.
              Whilst not intended to be a full-fledged desktop environment in and of itself, it is an example of
              how such an environment can be built.

       kiosk  The  kiosk  shell  is  intended for environments which want to run a single application at a time.
              Applications will be made full screen and activated as they are started.

       fullscreen
              The fullscreen shell is a deprecated implementation of  the  ideas  behind  the  kiosk  shell.  It
              requires specific client support for the zwp_fullscreen_shell_v1 interface.

       ivi    The  IVI  shell  is  a special-purpose shell which exposes an API compatible with the GENIVI Layer
              Manager  to  user-provided  HMI  controller  modules.   It  is  intended  for  use  in  automotive
              environments.

XWAYLAND

       Weston can support X11 clients running within a Weston session via an X server called Xwayland.  Xwayland
       is  built as a separate executable, provided by X.Org. Once built and installed, it can be activated with
       the --xwayland option. Weston will listen on a new X11 display socket and export it through  the  DISPLAY
       environment variable.

       It  has  also its own X window manager where cursor themes and sizes can be chosen using XCURSOR_PATH and
       XCURSOR_SIZE environment variables. See ENVIRONMENT.

OPTIONS

Weston core options:
-Bbackend1,backend2, --backend=backend1,backend2
Load the comma-separated list of backends instead of the default backend, see BACKENDS. The
backend modules are searched for in /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/weston. The default backend is drm
unless the environment suggests otherwise, see DISPLAY and WAYLAND_DISPLAY. The first backend is
the primary backend, and it provides the renderer. Not all backends support being loaded as
secondary backends, which reuse the primary backend's renderer.

-cconfig.ini, --config=config.ini
Load config.ini instead of weston.ini. The argument can also be an absolute path starting with a
/. If the path is not absolute, it will be searched in the normal config paths, see
weston.ini(5). This option is ignored if the --no-config option is passed.

--debug
Enable debug protocol extension weston_debug_v1 which any client can use to receive debugging
messages from the compositor.

WARNING: This is risky for two reasons. First, a client may cause a denial-of-service blocking the
compositor by providing an unsuitable file descriptor, and second, the debug messages may expose
sensitive information. Additionally this will expose weston-screenshooter interface allowing the
user to take screenshots of the outputs using weston-screenshooter application, which can lead to
silently leaking the output contents. This option should not be used in production.

-fscope1,scope2, --flight-rec-scopes=scope1,scope2
Specify to which scopes should subscribe to. Useful to control which streams to write data into
the flight recorder. Flight recorder has limited space, once the flight recorder is full new data
will overwrite the old data. Without any scopes specified, it subscribes to 'log' and 'drm-
backend' scopes. Passing an empty value would disable the flight recorder entirely.

-h, --help
Print a summary of command line options, and quit.

-iN, --idle-time=N
Set the idle timeout to N seconds. The default timeout is 300 seconds. When there has not been any
user input for the idle timeout, Weston enters an inactive mode. The screen fades to black,
monitors may switch off, and the shell may lock the session. A value of 0 effectively disables
the timeout.

--log=file.log
Append log messages to the file file.log instead of writing them to stderr.

-lscope1,scope2, --logger-scopes=scope1,scope2
Specify to which log scopes should subscribe to. When no scopes are supplied, the log "log" scope
will be subscribed by default. Useful to control which streams to write data into the logger and
can be helpful in diagnosing early start-up code.

--modules=module1.so,module2.so
Load the comma-separated list of modules. Only used by the test suite. The file is searched for in
/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/weston, or you can pass an absolute path.

--no-config
Do not read weston.ini for the compositor. Avoids e.g. loading compositor modules via the
configuration file, which is useful for unit tests.

--renderer=renderer
Select which renderer to use for Weston's internal composition. Defaults to automatic selection.

--shell=shell
Select which shell to load to provide Weston's user interface. See ENVIRONMENT.

-Sname, --socket=name
Weston will listen in the Wayland socket called name. Weston will export WAYLAND_DISPLAY with
this value in the environment for all child processes to allow them to connect to the right server
automatically. --version Print the program version.

--wait-for-debugger
Raises SIGSTOP before initializing the compositor. This allows the user to attach with a debugger
and continue execution by sending SIGCONT. This is useful for debugging a crash on start-up when
it would be inconvenient to launch weston directly from a debugger. There is also a weston.ini
option to do the same.

--xwayland
Support X11 clients through the Xwayland server.

DRM backend options:
See weston-drm(7).

Wayland backend options:
--display=display
Name of the Wayland display to connect to, see also WAYLAND_DISPLAY of the environment.

--fullscreen
Create a single fullscreen output

--output-count=N
Create N Wayland windows to emulate the same number of outputs.

--width=W, --height=H
Make all outputs have a size of WxH pixels.

--scale=N
Give all outputs a scale factor of N.

--use-pixman
Deprecated in favour of the --renderer option. Use the pixman renderer. By default weston will
try to use EGL and GLES2 for rendering and will fall back to the pixman-based renderer for
software compositing if EGL cannot be used. Passing this option will force weston to use the
pixman renderer.

X11 backend options:
--fullscreen

--no-input
Do not provide any input devices. Used for testing input-less Weston.

--output-count=N
Create N X windows to emulate the same number of outputs.

--width=W, --height=H
Make the default size of each X window WxH pixels.

--scale=N
Give all outputs a scale factor of N.

--use-pixman
Deprecated in favour of the --renderer option. Use the pixman renderer. By default weston will
try to use EGL and GLES2 for rendering. Passing this option will make weston use the pixman
library for software compsiting.

RDP backend options:
See weston-rdp(7).

VNC backend options:
See weston-vnc(7).

FILES

       If the environment variable is set, the configuration file is read from the respective path.

       $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/weston.ini
       $HOME/.config/weston.ini

ENVIRONMENT

DISPLAY
The X display. If DISPLAY is set, and WAYLAND_DISPLAY is not set, the default backend becomes x11.

WAYLAND_DEBUG
If set to any value, causes libwayland to print the live protocol to stderr.

WAYLAND_DISPLAY
The name of the display (socket) of an already running Wayland server, without the path. The
directory path is always taken from XDG_RUNTIME_DIR. If WAYLAND_DISPLAY is not set, the socket
name is "wayland-0".

If WAYLAND_DISPLAY is already set, the default backend becomes wayland. This allows launching
Weston as a nested server.

WAYLAND_SOCKET
For Wayland clients, holds the file descriptor of an open local socket to a Wayland server.

WESTON_CONFIG_FILE
Weston sets this variable to the absolute path of the configuration file it loads, or to the empty
string if no file is used. Programs that use weston.ini will read the file specified by this
variable instead, or do not read any file if it is empty. Unset variable causes falling back to
the default name weston.ini.

XCURSOR_PATH
Set the list of paths to look for cursors in. It changes both libwayland-cursor and libXcursor, so
it affects both Wayland and X11 based clients. See xcursor (3).

XCURSOR_SIZE
This variable can be set for choosing an specific size of cursor. Affect Wayland and X11 clients.
See xcursor (3).

XDG_CONFIG_HOME
If set, specifies the directory where to look for weston.ini.

XDG_RUNTIME_DIR
The directory for Weston's socket and lock files. Wayland clients will automatically use this.

BUGS

       Bugs should be reported to https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayland/weston/.

WWW

       https://wayland.freedesktop.org/

EXAMPLES

       Launch Weston with the DRM backend on a VT
              weston

       Launch Weston with the DRM backend and XWayland support
              weston --xwayland

       Launch Weston (wayland-1) nested in another Weston instance (wayland-0)
              WAYLAND_DISPLAY=wayland-0 weston -Swayland-1

       From an X terminal, launch Weston with the x11 backend
              weston