Wayland implementation

[LDprg]

Wayland with freerdp isnt that hard, we just need select between xfreerdp and the wlfreerdp command. This could happen automatically (based on env vars) or on a config field.

I would prefer to select automatically, as long as no config field is set.

Edit: fix typo

[TheStachelfisch]

wlfreerdp doesn't feature support for seamless windows. Only for full sessions.
Recently in the new beta release a new backend using SDL2 was announced which should have native wayland support and it supports RAIL (Remote Applications integrated locally). wlfreerdp will not have RAIL implemented.

I myself haven't tested yet, if sdl-freerdp works well with Wayland and using RAIL.
But it might be worth a shot.

Running SDL2 using Wayland: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/wayland#SDL2
Relevant: FreeRDP/FreeRDP#6573 (comment)
FreeRDP Release implementing SDL2: https://github.com/FreeRDP/FreeRDP/releases/tag/3.0.0-beta1

[LDprg]

Thx for the information.

We should probably shift using sdl-freerdp instead (even it is beta for now, but wlfreerdp makes no sense without RAIL). For me it seems like sdl-freerdp has the same interface as xfreerdp or wlfreerdp. However I didn't find an actual documentation to verify this.
Furthermore sdl-freerdp would be able to simplify the code for winapps, as we could use it for x11 and wayland.

[LDprg]

I am not sure if sdl-freerdp currently supports RAIL (see here)
However there's a PR and RAILs is listed on the next milestones of freerdp.

[TheStachelfisch]

I am not sure if sdl-freerdp currently supports RAIL (see here)
However there's a PR and RAILs is listed on the next milestones of freerdp.

Hmm yeah you're right, I missed that. When I built freerdp and checked the help command of sdl-freerdp it showed, that the /app parameter was there.
But still good to know, that it's being worked on

[Shaarigan]

+1 from here since Nobara Linux just shipps with Wayland only

[LDprg]

@Shaarigan Are you sure? I did use nobara a while back ago (the official image). As far as I know you can switch wayland and x11 using gdm or sddm.

[Shaarigan]

Thought I read that on their website but they however focus on Wayland cause of VRR and some pathches focus on Wayland. I anyways never tried using X11 cause of Waydroid 🤷

[LDprg]

@oskardotglobal Maybe we should consider a alternative solution for wayland users especially for the rewrite, until sdl-freerdp is ready.

So everyone feel free to point out a possible tool for this purpose.

The tool has to fulfill following things:

• Wayland support
• Rails support or something similar (Application only streaming)
• Controllable via Rust or shell
• Fast and Simple (or automated) setup
• Fast integration into winapps rewrite
• Clipboard support

If you know a tool that only partially fits also feel free to comment.

[Shaarigan]

No they don't.

On windows, there was no concept of separate GUI sessions for a long time, until recently via Remote Desktop, which is a hybrid solution. Which means windows VNC servers essentially mirror the contents of the primary monitor in their own memory, and send that virtual copy over VNC. It is thus sometimes desirable to be able to limit which chunk of a physical display to mirror - hence, the feature

On Linux this workes however opening an X11 remote session

[Shaarigan]

I tried to google for alternatives but it seems there isn't anything. Other projects that support RAIL are built on top of FreeRDP

[LDprg]

I have only one idea left. How about a modified spice client, would this work out?

[oskardotglobal]

Well we could use any protocol along with a custom client if we can just crop the stream to a window (although we'd have to send the window positions to the host somehow or determine them via the image)

Or we just write our own protocol / client + server (at second though, no)

[Shaarigan]

Maybe worth looking at Waydroid?
Waydroid is an Android Container running Apps on near native Linux performance and they also have a windowed mode one could use to have seamless windows as well - and they're running on wayland by default

[Shaarigan]

Do you think it might work under xwayland?

[LDprg]

Nope xwayland does not work at least for freerdp. RAIL seems to be very unstable with freerdp.

[LDprg]

Another option would to take a look at https://github.com/casualsnek/cassowary which apparently seems to work on wayland (as people reported in the issues).

[Shaarigan]

Following some gaming distro discussion, it seems that KDE as well as at least Fedora are in decision to drop X11 in the future so Wayland might become a must have

[Shaarigan]

Can't find any source thats talking about Cassowary working on Wayland session. They seem to use freeRDP as well so they should have the same issues as WinApps on Wayland?

[LDprg]

Strange why are people then reporting cassowary to work on wayland in the github issues?

[Shaarigan]

Quote from the dev
AFAIK wlfreerdp does not support RAIL or Remote apps https://github.com/FreeRDP/FreeRDP/issues/5076 The wlfreerdp is there just for testing or while using full sessions. So if you want to use remote apps its recommended to use xfreerdp with Xwayland until freerdp wayland client has RAIL support !
casualsnek/cassowary#95

So either you're wrong and it works using xfreerdp and xwaylandbridge or the author is wrong and it causes trouble at some other point. I don't know and honestly have no time nor a propper configured system right now to test it, sorry 🤷

[eylenburg]

Following some gaming distro discussion, it seems that KDE as well as at least Fedora are in decision to drop X11 in the future so Wayland might become a must have

KDE will not drop X11 but Wayland will be the default with Plasma 6 (release next month). Only Fedora will drop X11.

Can't find any source thats talking about Cassowary working on Wayland session. They seem to use freeRDP as well so they should have the same issues as WinApps on Wayland?

That's true, it uses FreeRDP. The main differences ti Winapps seem to be that it has a GUI for settings and that it auto-suspends the Windows VM if not currently in use

[Shaarigan]

I said
are in decision to drop X11 in the future

You are right that only Fedora set it for now but time will show however 🤷

[ludg1e]

Hello guys!
Hope you're doing great

While digging on WinApps and Cassowary, I've got the Docker image that you provide, to work with RDP through xfreerdp on wayland (hyprland) through xwayland

It seems to work well, though on hyprland I'm getting a new invisible window called "RemoteApp Marker Window", which I can close through the Alt-Tab switcher
Also, the shadows on tooltips of folders (in case of explorer.exe), have the hyprland shadow blur effect (it seems the compositor affects the rdp "instance"?)

Opening multiple windows seems to work as well

Note that I'm not using xwaylandvideobridge nor anything else, just xfreerdp connected to the docker image
Using archlinux, but I guess it could work on any distro

The behaviour (as far as I've tested only on explorer.exe) seems to be the same as per using on xorg (I use xfce)

Attached some screenshots

[ludg1e]

Notes from xorg:

• "Latency" error from explorer.exe window isn't present
• The bug of the paint.net installer window moving by its own is present on xorg
• The bug where paint.net toolbar is always focused is present too
  So, these last two "bugs" aren't wayland exclusive

I would guess the image clipboard bug is probably from my distro (some missing package) rather than SPICE or RDP

Summary: it's usable on wayland depending which program you need to use, your luck may vary

[AkechiShiro]

@ludg1e Freerdp is coming with full support for Wayland, with SDL3 I believe, @LDprg do you confirm SDL3 brings Wayland support ?

[ludg1e]

@AkechiShiro Yes, I'm aware, but currently sdlfreerdp (afaik) doesn't support RAILS (FreeRDP/FreeRDP#9169)
As well as who knows when will SDL3 release

[AkechiShiro]

SDL3 was already released @ludg1e beta testing is ongoing with FreeRDP, RAILS support is still missing but is coming in the near future.

[oskardotglobal]

Hello, thanks for the awesome writeup. The "RemoteApp Marker Window" appears on all distros, that is intended behaviour. We will support wayland fully once RAILS is available for sdlfreerdp

[skabeche]

Hi, is there any update on this? Wayland is becoming more present now and it would need to be supported.
Thanks for your great work.

[AkechiShiro]

Hi @skabeche

We're looking into solutions, but at the moment, we are still investigating, I've been looking on this : https://forum.qubes-os.org/t/windows-support-in-qubes/4288

But I haven't had the time to check if that works on Wayland or not : https://github.com/elliotkillick/qvm-create-windows-qube

Also it seems to be working under Plasma 6 KDE (Wayland) at the moment