So, I’ve been running Wayland for a while and have no issues anymore, so I was just pondering if it is possible to remove Xorg altogether from one’s system.
Just to see what I have on my system with xorg in the name I ran:
$ yay -Qq | grep xorg
xorg-fonts-encodings
xorg-server
xorg-server-common
xorg-setxkbmap
xorg-xauth
xorg-xdpyinfo
xorg-xev
xorg-xhost
xorg-xinit
xorg-xinput
xorg-xkbcomp
xorg-xkill
xorg-xmodmap
xorg-xprop
xorg-xrandr
xorg-xrdb
xorg-xset
xorg-xsetroot
xorg-xwayland
xorgproto
What is “safe” to remove if I am using wayland, and what should remain (and why)?
Thanks!
dalto
September 9, 2023, 10:05pm
2
Are you only using Wayland-native applications?
In most cases, applications are still using X via xwayland.
1 Like
Would all applications that use X11 have some dependency to xorg-* packages?
So far it seems like the main problem is Gnome using xorg as a dependency:
$ yay -Rncs xorg-server-common
checking dependencies...
:: networkmanager optionally requires bluez: Bluetooth support
:: networkmanager-openvpn optionally requires libnma-gtk4: GUI support (GTK 4)
:: system-config-printer optionally requires cups-pk-helper: PolicyKit helper to configure cups with fine-grained privileges
:: weston optionally requires xorg-xwayland: support x11 backend
Package (30) Old Version Net Change
bluez 5.69-1 -2.71 MiB
bolt 0.9.5-1 -0.44 MiB
colord-gtk-common 0.3.0-2 -0.12 MiB
colord-gtk4 0.3.0-2 -0.03 MiB
cups-pk-helper 0.2.7-1 -0.35 MiB
gdm 44.1-1 -4.66 MiB
gnome-bluetooth-3.0 42.6-1 -1.18 MiB
gnome-color-manager 3.36.0+r42+g90481514-1 -3.02 MiB
gnome-control-center 44.3-1 -21.58 MiB
gnome-online-accounts 3.48.0-2 -1.57 MiB
gnome-session 44.0-1 -1.43 MiB
gnome-shell 1:44.4-1 -11.54 MiB
gsound 1.0.3-3 -0.27 MiB
iio-sensor-proxy 3.4-1 -0.10 MiB
libgdm 44.1-1 -0.62 MiB
libgnomekbd 1:3.28.1-1 -0.69 MiB
libgoa 3.48.0-2 -3.56 MiB
libibus 1.5.28-4 -108.93 MiB
libical 3.0.16-5 -7.13 MiB
libnma-gtk4 1.10.6-2 -0.45 MiB
libxcvt 0.1.2-1 -0.03 MiB
libxfont2 2.0.6-2 -0.23 MiB
libxklavier 5.4-5 -0.36 MiB
mutter 44.4-1 -14.13 MiB
xorg-server 21.1.8-2 -3.73 MiB
xorg-setxkbmap 1.3.4-1 -0.03 MiB
xorg-xhost 1.0.9-1 -0.03 MiB
xorg-xkbcomp 1.4.6-1 -0.21 MiB
xorg-xwayland 23.2.0-1 -2.23 MiB
xorg-server-common 21.1.8-2 -0.12 MiB
If this method is accurate, then surprisingly most applications I’ve installed don’t seem to care…
I guess Gnome uses both X11 and Wayland so depends on both… Therefore I can’t remove them…
dalto
September 10, 2023, 3:21pm
4
In my experience, they usually do not.
That would mean there no way to determine what would be affected using the package manager… And that’s likely the only way…
I guess I’ll just leave things alone then.
I also had this in mind, to remove the legacy Xorg under Gnome, but I think it’s way too early for that. Let’s just wait and see. At some point it just won’t be there anymore and we won’t even notice it. Or we ourselves will be like that …
running Plasma not Gnome, but I was able to remove all but
xf86-input-libinput
xorg-fonts-encodings
xorg-server
xorg-server-common
xorg-setxkbmap
xorg-xauth
xorg-xdpyinfo
xorg-xkbcomp
xorg-xmessage
xorg-xprop
xorg-xrdb
xorg-xset
xorg-xsetroot
xorg-xwayland
xorgproto
Thanks for this. Here is what I’ve been able to minimize mine to with Gnome:
$ yay -Qq | grep xorg
xorg-fonts-encodings
xorg-server
xorg-server-common
xorg-setxkbmap
xorg-xhost
xorg-xkbcomp
xorg-xprop
xorg-xrandr
xorg-xrdb
xorg-xset
xorg-xwayland
xorgproto
There’s a lot of overlap between the two.
So far I haven’t noticed any applications I use “break”…
Visual diff with Meld:
So xorg-xrandr is actually required by Steam on my machine.
On the other hand xorg-xhost is used by Gnome’s display manager.
Yep I’ve not noticed anything breaking either.
