Mark just announced support for Wayland in Ubuntu in future. I was just wondering the following (hopefully Mark can answer).
- When will a version be available to test?
- Will it be available as a package(s) in the repository or will it be delivered as its own distribution?
- When do you expect it to take over as the default?
Mark stated that they will be able to deliver something in 6 month ( that means Ubuntu 11.04 ).
That may mean that there will be a way to install Wayland ( from repository ) and replace X with that; probably only for test purposes.
Also, according to Mark X application will continue to run under Wayland in a sort of compatibility mode.
Graphics toolkits should be ported from X to Wayland to be 100% native (Qt is almost there), so I believe that we won't see Wayland as default before Ubuntu 12.10.
(Qt on Wayland) http://virtuousgeek.org/blog/index.php/jbarnes/2010/09/20/qt_on_wayland_first_clock
There is a Maverick PPA containing Wayland packages: (but I'm only allowed to post one url)
There is no reason it would be a separate distribution.
I have a script to build Wayland on Ubuntu Maverick here: http://www.chaosreigns.com/wayland/ubuntu.html
And more info about Wayland here: (but I'm only allowed to post one url)
There has not even been a source code release of Wayland yet, it's only available via git repository.
As most probably know by now, Mark decided to drop Wayland and make their own display server called Mir. Basically because with their Unity project, they want to have a consistent display stack across all devices (desktops, laptops, tablets, phones, TVs, etc...) and wanted to have more control over this development.
Yet another reason not to get ahead of yourself and to wait for the actual release. I have a bad habit of taking something like Marks earlier post on Wayland and running with it and have been disappointed many a time.
More on Mir: