v0.4.0 Gathering raw ores

So... It's been 3.5 years since the last release, but by no means has the project lost its steam, it's quite the opposite, it's more lively than ever. The reason for the release gap is simply the fact that we all got used to using cargo git dependencies, for the constant stream of latest and greatest features.

Wayland-rs 0.30

The big highlight of 0.4 is the development of wayland-rs 0.30 by @elinorbgr followed by the porting of Smithay to it by @PolyMeilex @i509VCB and @Drakulix which changed the design direction of the project significantly and opened a lot of new possibilities when it comes to Smithay's API design.

Desktop & Rendering Abstractions

Introduced by @Drakulix desktop abstractions solve a lot of the busy work needed for a typical desktop shell, they introduce 2D Spaces that elements like TopLevels and Layers can be mapped onto for easier tracking of popups, z-order and most importantly, full damage tracking via RenderElements.
As a cherry on top, you can combine this with the new DrmCompositor abstraction by @cmeissl to achieve proper DRM Planes support and fully leverage your hardware's capabilities.

New Protocols

• WLR Layer Shell protocol by @PolyMeilex in #354
• XDG activation protocol by @PolyMeilex in #358
• XDG decoration protocol by @PolyMeilex in #394
• Add wl-touch support by @chrisduerr in #499
• Add support for viewporter by @cmeissl in #588
• Add support for the wp_primary_selection protocol by @Drakulix in #670
• Input method and text input protocols by @rano-oss in #443
• KDE server-decoration protocol by @chrisduerr in #410
• Shortcuts inhibit protocol by @PolyMeilex in #687
• Virtual keyboard protocol by @rano-oss in #720
• wp presentation protocol by @cmeissl in #794
• Support fractional scale by @cmeissl in #840
• Relative pointer protocol by @ids1024 in #757
• XDG shell versions 3,4,5 by @cmeissl
• XDG shell version 6 by @PolyMeilex in #1130
• WpContentType protocol by @PolyMeilex in #1011
• zwp_idle_inhibit protocol by @chrisduerr in #1004
• Security Context protocol by @ids1024 in #1106
• zwp_pointer_gestures_v1 protocol by @YaLTeR in #1114
• Pointer constraints protocol by @ids1024 in #872
• drm leasing by @Drakulix in #1132
• cursor_shape_v1 protocol by @kchibisov in #1154
• wlr-data-control protocol by @kchibisov in #1151
• ext-session-lock protocol by @YaLTeR in #1166
• High res scrolling support (wl_pointer version 8) by @ids1024 in #1246
• Implement axis_relative_direction (wl_pointer version 9) by @ids1024 in #1253
• ext-idle-notify protocol by @YaLTeR in #1320
• XdgForeign protocol by @PolyMeilex in #1342
• XWayland shell protocol by @colinmarc in #1351
• wp alpha modifier protocol by @PolyMeilex in #1426
• XDG Dialog protocol by @PolyMeilex in #1389
• foreign_toplevel_list protocol by @PolyMeilex in #1513
• xdg_toplevel_icon protocol by @PolyMeilex in #1512
• linux-drm-syncobj-v1 protocol by @ids1024 in #1356
• xdg_system_bell protocol by @PolyMeilex in #1566
• wl_shm version 2 by @PolyMeilex in #1532
• fifo-v1 and commit-timing-v1 protocol by @cmeissl in #1588

Backend changes

• X11 backend by @i509VCB in #371
• Desktop abstractions by @Drakulix in #423
• Popup grabs for desktop abstraction by @cmeissl in #467
• Add support for GPUs without instanced rendering by @chrisduerr in #495
• Introduce MultiGPU renderer by @Drakulix in #503
• Feature/opaque regions by @cmeissl in #659
• The Vulkan allocator by @i509VCB in #614
• input: Split off input-handling and wayland-specific seat handling by @Drakulix in #689
• renderer: Add glow integration by @Drakulix in #744
• X11 wm in smithay by @Drakulix in #570
• gles2: custom shaders by @Drakulix in #901
• DRM planes with DrmCompositor by @cmeissl in #760
• Introduce DRM abstractions crate by @PolyMeilex in #924
• Surface Transactions by @Drakulix in #1009
• Perf optimizations by @cmeissl in #1086 & #1128
• Feature/software renderer by @cmeissl in #1228
• Perf/tiled renderers by @cmeissl in #1449
• libdisplay-info integration by @cmeissl in #1522
• DrmOutputManager by @cmeissl in #1576

And many more changes that would take to long to list: v0.3.0...v0.4.0

Version 0.3: Raising the heat

Large parts of Smithay were changed with numerous API changes. It is thus recommended to approach version 0.3 as if it was a new crate altogether compared to 0.2.

The most notable changes are:

• Deep refactor of the graphics backends around a workflows centered on allocating graphics buffers, and a Gles2-based renderer abstraction is provided.
• Support for DRM atomic modesetting as well as client-provided DMABUF
• Most backends are now calloop event sources generating events. The recommended organization for your smithay-based compositor is thus to centralize most of your logic on a global state struct, and delegate event handling to it via the shared data mechanism of calloop. Most of the callbacks you provide to Smithay are given mutable access to this shared data.
• The wayland::compositor handling logic now automatically handles state tracking and delayed commit for wayland surfaces.

Many thanks to the new contributors to Smithay, who contributed the following:

• Support for libseat as a session backend, by @PolyMeilex
• Support for graphics tablets via the tablet protocol extension, by @PolyMeilex
• Support for running Smithay on aarch64 architectures, by @cmeissl
• A rework of the xdg-shell handlers to better fit the protocol logic and correctly track configure events, by @cmeissl
• Basic Xwayland support, by @psychon

First release: Building the hearth

This is the first release of smithay, the rusty wayland compositor smithy.

This release brings the very bases necessary to start building a wayland compositor, namely:

• some logic to handle the most fundamental parts of the wayland protocol
• a backend system, allowing you to start you compositor either as a window client using winit (useful for testing) or directly in a TTY (though this last one is still experimental)

Changelog for version 0.1.0 (2017-10-01)

Protocol handling

• Low-level handling routines for several wayland globals:
  • wayland::shm handles wl_shm
  • wayland::compositor handles wl_compositor and wl_subcompositor
  • wayland::shell handles wl_shell and wdg_shell
  • wayland::seat handles wl_seat
  • wayland::output handles wl_output

Backend

• Winit backend (EGL context & input)
• DRM backend
• libinput backend
• glium integration