Wayland support

[helloIAmPau]

Hi all, do you have any plan to support wayland?

It looks to be the new standard for Linux (in Arch Linux already it is) and it is a little frustrating I can't use my dell dock at work.

Thanks and have a nice day :)

[displaylink-mlukaszek]

Our distro of focus is Ubuntu, so after X is dropped it will probably be Mir first. However, I thought Wayland still builds on KMS? Page flipping support is already present in evdi as this is how Chrome OS and its Ozone interfaces with it.

I'll keep this open, in hope that someone familiar with Wayland takes over and proposes changes if necessary.

[sheepdestroyer]

wayland becomes default in Fedora 25 next week too would be nice to keep using my two external screens at work when I update.

[helloIAmPau]

Ok, I can confirm that evdi works fine on Ubuntu and I don't have any problem to switch the Linux distribution on my laptop. It will be great to have it working on Arch as well, but I can wait for it.

[ghost]

I have it working nearly without bugs on F24 Wayland. F25 evdi doesnt work at all. 4.8.8-200.fc24 ,4.8.8-300.fc25

Fedora 25, up to date. Displaylink installed without any issues.

https://gist.github.com/ment0s/fc9a11c6b77a41870e215e7a5d4522dc

[displaylink-mlukaszek]

To work with Wayland, evdi lacks GBM. For anyone that would be willing to have a go and develop a GBM backend, here's how it was already implemented for Chrome OS in their minigbm: https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromiumos/platform/minigbm/+/master/evdi.c

[konradrenner]

So with Ubuntu shifting back to GNOME: https://insights.ubuntu.com/2017/04/05/growing-ubuntu-for-cloud-and-iot-rather-than-phone-and-convergence/ they will also use Wayland as display server in the future. So any chance to get Wayland support :-) ?

[cacarr-pdxweb]

With the aforementioned death of Mir and Ubuntu's move to Wayland, it would be nice to know DisplayLink's intentions -- support Wayland or give up on Linux desktop distros entirely?

update

Wayland support is in the works, apparently. Alban Rampon on Twitter: "It's a big job, in progress."

[MichaelJCole]

Pinged Alban Rampon on Twitter. He hasn't gotten back to me yet. Maybe you have better luck?

[cacarr-pdxweb]

Haven't hear anything more from Alban Rampon.

Sure would be nice to use my DisplayLink display in vertical orientation, with my Antergos-running X1 Carbon.

[agronholm]

I doubt this will ever happen, as Thunderbolt/USB-C type docks are becoming increasingly common and require no specific software drivers.

[MichaelJCole]

@agronholm Have you tried this with multiple monitors on Linux? A quick search didn't pull up anything on Amazon, but I'm not sure what I'm looking for. The DisplayLink I bought from Amazon was supposed to work but well...

[agronholm]

I have a 3 monitor setup right now with a Dell Thunderbolt dock. Works quite well.

Clarification: Laptop + 2 external monitors via the dock.

[cacarr-pdxweb]

@agronholm

You think Mr. Rampon is lying about it being in progress? Or do you think they'll give up on the project?

[displaylink-mlukaszek]

Rest assured, we have every intention to add Wayland support. It is just not trivial, as current versions of Wayland don't play well with multiple GPUs in the system. Hang in there.

[cacarr-pdxweb]

@displaylink-mlukaszek

Will the Wayland-supporting version enable rotation/portrait orientation?

[cacarr-pdxweb]

@displaylink-mlukaszek

Also, is development of this driver contingent on updates to Wayland?

[agronholm]

I had not seen that twitter message or the edited comment that mentioned it.

[displaylink-mlukaszek]

Having no legacy of X makes it easier to make it resilient to updates to Wayland, or to support features like rotation. Note that rotation works on some systems even with X.

[MichaelJCole]

@displaylink-mlukaszek Thanks! I'd be happy to test. I'm running Gnome Ubuntu 17.04 with Wayland (which is +/- the base for the next Ubuntu LTS).

[b3nto]

Okay, thanks.

I am running Arch 64[4.9.48-1-lts], just converted to LTS kernel and now everything works. For some reason 4.12.12-1 does not work at all. It crashes and has several issues.

On 09/11/2017 11:25 AM, Michael Cole wrote:

@displaylink-mlukaszek https://github.com/displaylink-mlukaszek Thanks! I'd be happy to test. I'm running Gnome Ubuntu with Wayland (which is +/- the base for the next Ubuntu LTS).

— You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub https://github.com/DisplayLink/evdi/issues/58#issuecomment-328616054, or mute the thread https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AC4cSbL7b4LOO09kAzcztDUIbe_MNu_Cks5shXswgaJpZM4Kzs17.

[RussianNeuroMancer]

@MichaelJCole

Have you tried this with multiple monitors on Linux? A quick search didn't pull up anything on Amazon, but I'm not sure what I'm looking for.

I didn't find your e-mail, so answering here.

I tested Dell WD15 dock with Dell 5855 and Dell 9250. Dell 5855 is USB 3.1 Gen 1 tablet, so only one display works. Dell 9250 is USB 3.1 Gen 2 tablet, so two displays works. I tested HDMI+VGA, so I have no idea if HDMI+DVI will work or not. If you are Ok with HDMI+VGA - Dell WD15 is most easy way.

If you want two or three displays attached via HDMI and DVI - then Dell TB16 is better choice, but keep in mind that you need latest firmware in dock AND in laptop/tablet so first thing to do is upgrade drivers for Thunderbolt 3 controller and upgrade firmware in laptop or tablet (both is requirement for dock firmware upgrade) only after this you can upgrade firmware in dock. Dock firmware upgrade is done in two steps: at first step Windows utility prepare UEFI for dock upgrade, at second step laptop reboot and perform dock upgrade from UEFI. So you'll need Dell's laptop or tablet with Thunderbolt 3 and running Windows to perform Dell TB16 upgrade. Without firmware upgrade TB16 is unusable. And don't buy TB15 as it has faulty hardware.

After firmware upgrade - Dell TB16 should work with any other Thunderbolt 3 compatible laptop or tablet with fresh firmware in Thunderbolt 3 controller (get upgraded as part of UEFI upgrade) running Linux.

[MichaelJCole]

Hey @RussianNeuroMancer, thanks for the reply. I had a Pluggable with the 3900 chip and it was cheaply made, very unstable under X, and a no-go on wayland.

I reinstalled Ubuntu to switch back to X, installed Gnome, and still had problems with it (needed to reconfigure screens every few minutes), so I threw it away.

I bought a SIIG docking station with the 5900 chip and it's much more stable under X. Haven't tried Wayland. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B074ZJ143Q/

Thanks for the feedback and advice, hopefully we'll help the next person.

[damianatorrpm]

I don't know when this happened but wayland works for me with fedora-26-displaylink-1.5.0-1.x86_64.rpm runnning on Fedora 27 beta.

Thank you so much!

[MartinBriza]

It does? Hmm, I'm on Fedora 27 and I don't get anything in my user session. It only seems to "work" with GDM, where I get either only the displaylink screen or my regular screen but not both at the same time... :/

[damianatorrpm]

Yep wayland fedora 27 here. https://us-store.acer.com/acer-usb-type-c-dock with Switch Aplha 12 (SA5-271) haven't tried with two displays attached to the dock yet but will so the next days.

[RussianNeuroMancer]

This looks like dock without DisplayLink hardware. You probably using integrated USB 3.1 display support (like in Dell WD15 dock mentioned above).

[damianatorrpm]

@MartinBriza @RussianNeuroMancer Wow I was completely unaware this even exists. What is the technology called? (google integrated USB 3.1 display support gives nothing)

Any command to check if it is displaylink or not?

[RussianNeuroMancer]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB-C#Alternate_Mode_partner_specifications

Any command to check if it is displaylink or not?

Just uninstall driver and check if dock still works.

[damianatorrpm]

@MartinBriza @RussianNeuroMancer Sorry for you guys - it works without displaylink driver

[stefansedich]

Are there any updates on Wayland support?

[Simonell]

When can we expect wayland support?

[davidmaxwaterman]

FYI, I gave up trying to get my Dell dock to work and bought a 'StarTech.com Thunderbolt 3 to Dual HDMI Adapter - 4K 30Hz - Windows Only Compatible - Thunderbolt 3 to HDMI - USB-C to HDMI', which worked nicely (after updating some firmware) with my two Dell monitors. It is only a dual HDMI, ie there's no USB or anything, but it does work perfectly. I did have trouble with my other dual monitor combo, but that was before I updated the firmware, and I've not had a chance to test that setup again, yet. Using Ubuntu 17.10.

[kq01526]

@displaylink-mlukaszek @DisplayLink-Admin

Any update?

[maxadamo]

this device supports Ubuntu only because Dell probably asked to support Ubuntu. They'll add support for Wayland only when Dell will ask for it.

[cacarr-pdxweb]

@maxadamo -Wayland is the default in 17.10. Final release of Bionic Beaver is April 26th. I would imagine that Dell will want to move to that pretty quickly? ... seeing as the Developer Editions still run 16.04, AFAIK.

They say they're working on it now -- pretty sure they're not going to ignore Wayland until they hear from Dell.

[maxadamo]

@cacarr-pdxweb I know. On the other side, if I'm not wrong, Dell supports only LTS. Hence they're not in a hurry.

[kq01526]

Today Canonical has announced not to use Wayland by default on Ubuntu 18.04, instead it will use Xorg by default, see:

https://insights.ubuntu.com/2018/01/26/bionic-beaver-18-04-lts-to-use-xorg-by-default/

[RussianNeuroMancer]

"but for 18.10 we will re-evaluate Wayland as the default"

[alowe7]

there's something funny with the whole dell-ubuntu-canonical-displaylink-microsoft axis.

its embrace-extend-extinguish all over again. and it won't work this time either.

how dumb do you all think we are? haha, maybe you're right. we are slow learners. but we get there.

let's review: displaylink won't support wayland until dell tells them to. dell only supports ubuntu lts for some unfathomable reason. ubuntu is driven by canonical canonical is in partnership with microsoft

its too bad dell makes such a great laptop in the xps13, but it only supports displaylink docking stations, and not that well. ubuntu support was hopeless, so bad it feels almost intentional.

whereas once I installed fedora, what a breath of fresh air. until I hit this wayland/displaylink garbage. we've been through this all before. but we'll get over it. if we have to write the drivers ourselves.

[RussianNeuroMancer]

Dell won't tell DisplayLink anything, because they moved from DisplayLink tech. in current generation of products. If I am missed some 2017 Dell's product that using DisplayLink chips - please let me know.

[maxadamo]

@RussianNeuroMancer let's say that Dell should support the old products for a while. They can't tell: "we support Ubuntu blah blah, only if you sell your device blah blah which was supported till yesterday". Otherwise, that means that we'll never see a driver, and we better sell our devices to some windows user. I can tell you guys, that Linux supports thunderbolt devices (without displaylink chip) very well. My Dell 13 XPS works well enough with one of these thunderbolt devices, tough I have to disable the WiFi due to an interference with thunderbolt which makes it crash. A newer model of the same Dell does not have this problem.

[alowe7]

appreciate your response. if dell abandoned displaylink, that would be good to know. my problem is with the d3100 docking stations. the ones I am looking at have displaylink logo all over them.

ubuntu had a lot of problems with them. it was just ridiculous.

fedora 27 was much better, and worked pretty much out of the box, except display would not recognize wayland and required xorg.

[RussianNeuroMancer]

let's say that Dell should support the old products for a while.

@maxadamo they do. After upgrade from previous LTS to next LTS, DisplayLink driver still will be working, as X11 remain default for 18.04 (user will only need to remove old driver before upgrade and install new one after upgade).

[MartinBriza]

I'm not the developer but for the sake of staying constructive, please refrain from developing conspiracy theories in this issue. DisplayLink adapters still work under X. X is not going anywhere in the near future. DisplayLink stated they're planning and most likely working on supporting their adapters under Wayland but it's a challenging task while the market for the driver is still niche. Let's please just be patient.

[alexryndin]

@damianatorrpm

Sorry for you guys - it works without displaylink driver

Does it work with not-acer notebooks?

[cacarr-pdxweb]

Any sort of progress update would be appreciated.

[b3nto]

Basically you can apply your patch as is, if you convert to lts kernel. I was going to write a wrapper but, it would basically force you to install lts.

On Fri, May 11, 2018, 9:08 PM Christopher Carr notifications@github.com wrote:

Any sort of progress update would be appreciated.

— You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub https://github.com/DisplayLink/evdi/issues/58#issuecomment-388528289, or mute the thread https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AC4cSasuRUq2iTiYXc8gf9PN5vbTbKCbks5txmA9gaJpZM4Kzs17 .

[cacarr-pdxweb]

@b3nto I was referring to a progress report on Wayland support.

[cacarr-pdxweb]

@MartinBriza

DisplayLink adapters still work under X

Except for xorg server versions > 1.19.6

[cacarr-pdxweb]

Alban Rampon says: "Work for Wayland has now started."

https://support.displaylink.com/forums/287786-displaylink-feature-suggestions/suggestions/16639654-linux-wayland-support?tracking_code=3a6981f74b15bf4aadbb24b70634a566