{"slug": "wayback", "name": "Wayback", "category": "other", "category_name": "Other software", "description": "", "recommenders": 6, "commenters": 7, "warners": 0, "score": 5.183, "rising": -1.96, "first": "2025-11-26", "latest": "2026-08-29", "why": "FWIW I think \"wayback\" is the project for this. It seems to be trying to use XWayland to run full X11 desktop environments on top of Wayland", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 6, "neutral": 1, "compare": 0, "warn": 0}, "spark": [2, 3, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "FWIW I think \"wayback\" is the project for this. It seems to be trying to use XWayland to run full X11 desktop environments on top of Wayland", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": "freedesktop.org", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://wayback.freedesktop.org", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Wayback"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 743843841, "item_id": 46490240, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46490240", "by": "craftkiller", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "FWIW I think \"wayback\" is the project for this. It seems to be trying to use XWayland to run full X11 desktop environments on top of Wayland", "excerpt": "> I'm not switching to Wayland until my window manager supports it. Looking at your github, it seems you use StumpWM. It seems they are also working on a wayland version under the name Mahogany. Development seems pretty active: https://github.com/stumpwm/mahogany > I'll probably switch, grudgingly, to XWayland whenever X gets removed from Debian. FWIW I think \"wayback\" is the project for this. It seems to be trying t", "context": "", "use_case": "running X11 desktops on Wayland", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 742393360, "item_id": 46399585, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46399585", "by": "yjftsjthsd-h", "date": "2025-12-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "there's always https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback for that.", "excerpt": "Eh, there's always https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback for that.", "context": "", "use_case": "running X11 apps on Wayland", "switched_from": "", "story": "QNX Self-Hosted Developer Desktop"}, {"id": 742095986, "item_id": 46380999, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46380999", "by": "singpolyma3", "date": "2025-12-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Long term if x11 starts having issues then probably https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback will be it", "excerpt": "Long term if x11 starts having issues then probably https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback will be it", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Phoenix: A modern X server written from scratch in Zig"}, {"id": 737707265, "item_id": 46106704, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46106704", "by": "seba_dos1", "date": "2025-12-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "For those who actually care about X11 DEs being kept supported, there's https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback", "excerpt": "No, thanks. For those who actually care about X11 DEs being kept supported, there's https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback", "context": "", "use_case": "Keeping X11 desktops supported", "switched_from": "", "story": "Xlibre is a fork of the Xorg Xserver with lots of code cleanups"}, {"id": 736948305, "item_id": 46059269, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46059269", "by": "ndiddy", "date": "2025-11-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "There's a new fdo project called Wayback", "excerpt": "There's a new fdo project called Wayback, which is a stub Wayland compositor that runs a rootful Xwayland that then acts as a full X server to host your X11 window manager/DE. Long-term, this will allow people who rely on X11 sessions to continue to run them indefinitely, while also providing better support for modern display hardware than Xorg's native KMS backend. https://wayback.freedesktop.org/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "KDE Plasma 6.8 Will Go Wayland-Exclusive in Dropping X11 Session Support"}]}], "caveats": [], "who": [], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["x11 on wayland compatibility", "running x11 desktops on wayland", "running x11 apps on wayland", "keeping x11 desktops supported", "run x11 window managers on wayland"], "compared": [{"slug": "xlibre", "name": "XLibre", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "kde-plasma", "name": "KDE Plasma", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46058531", "title": "KDE Plasma 6.8 Will Go Wayland-Exclusive in Dropping X11 Session Support", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49415386", "title": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46485989", "title": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46398201", "title": "QNX Self-Hosted Developer Desktop", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46380075", "title": "Phoenix: A modern X server written from scratch in Zig", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46105897", "title": "Xlibre is a fork of the Xorg Xserver with lots of code cleanups", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"recommend": 2}, "2025-12": {"recommend": 3}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 791901312, "item_id": 49493832, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49493832", "by": "weikju", "date": "2026-08-29", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "It exists:", "excerpt": "It exists: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback", "context": "", "use_case": "X11 on Wayland compatibility", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tether: iMessage, SMS, etc. on Linux"}, {"id": 743843841, "item_id": 46490240, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46490240", "by": "craftkiller", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "FWIW I think \"wayback\" is the project for this. It seems to be trying to use XWayland to run full X11 desktop environments on top of Wayland", "excerpt": "> I'm not switching to Wayland until my window manager supports it. Looking at your github, it seems you use StumpWM. It seems they are also working on a wayland version under the name Mahogany. Development seems pretty active: https://github.com/stumpwm/mahogany > I'll probably switch, grudgingly, to XWayland whenever X gets removed from Debian. FWIW I think \"wayback\" is the project for this. It seems to be trying t", "context": "", "use_case": "running X11 desktops on Wayland", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 742393360, "item_id": 46399585, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46399585", "by": "yjftsjthsd-h", "date": "2025-12-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "there's always https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback for that.", "excerpt": "Eh, there's always https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback for that.", "context": "", "use_case": "running X11 apps on Wayland", "switched_from": "", "story": "QNX Self-Hosted Developer Desktop"}, {"id": 742095986, "item_id": 46380999, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46380999", "by": "singpolyma3", "date": "2025-12-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Long term if x11 starts having issues then probably https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback will be it", "excerpt": "Long term if x11 starts having issues then probably https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback will be it", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Phoenix: A modern X server written from scratch in Zig"}, {"id": 737707265, "item_id": 46106704, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46106704", "by": "seba_dos1", "date": "2025-12-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "For those who actually care about X11 DEs being kept supported, there's https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback", "excerpt": "No, thanks. For those who actually care about X11 DEs being kept supported, there's https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback", "context": "", "use_case": "Keeping X11 desktops supported", "switched_from": "", "story": "Xlibre is a fork of the Xorg Xserver with lots of code cleanups"}, {"id": 736948305, "item_id": 46059269, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46059269", "by": "ndiddy", "date": "2025-11-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "There's a new fdo project called Wayback", "excerpt": "There's a new fdo project called Wayback, which is a stub Wayland compositor that runs a rootful Xwayland that then acts as a full X server to host your X11 window manager/DE. Long-term, this will allow people who rely on X11 sessions to continue to run them indefinitely, while also providing better support for modern display hardware than Xorg's native KMS backend. https://wayback.freedesktop.org/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "KDE Plasma 6.8 Will Go Wayland-Exclusive in Dropping X11 Session Support"}, {"id": 736946576, "item_id": 46059161, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46059161", "by": "aseipp", "date": "2025-11-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the answer is to just use Wayback. It is a different X11 server implementation that uses Wayland under the hood", "excerpt": "For users of older window managers on newer distros where X is likely to be removed \"soon-ish\" (vs LTS distros), the answer is to just use Wayback. It is a different X11 server implementation that uses Wayland under the hood, and is enough to run your WM. There are already people who use it to run AwesomeWM, IceWM, etc: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayback/wayback That said, you cannot run Wayland apps this way, it", "context": "", "use_case": "run X11 window managers on Wayland", "switched_from": "", "story": "KDE Plasma 6.8 Will Go Wayland-Exclusive in Dropping X11 Session Support"}]}