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doc:de-compat

Desktop Environment Compatibility

This page is about compatibility with X2Go Server, not with X2Go Client (or PyHoca-GUI or PyHoca-CLI.)

X2Go Client should be able to run under any and every X11-based desktop environment. Wayland-based desktop environments need testing.

Explanation

X2Go's “X Server” is called “nxagent”. It is part of the nx-libs package.

As of version 3.5.0.x, nxagent is forked from the X.org 6.9 codebase (from 2005) feature-wise (but not security-wise, where it is at much newer level). Therefore, there are multiple reasons why certain modern “3d-ish” desktops are incompatible with nxagent, and therefore X2Go.

  • The desktop environment requires the X11 extension “Xcomposite”, which nxagent 3.5.0.x and X.org 6.9 do not support.
  • The desktop environment requires a newer version of the X11 extension “GLX” (OpenGL) than nxagent 3.5.0.x and X.org 6.9 provide (version 1.2). Note: there's a workaround for this: glx-xlib-workaround
  • The desktop environment requires a newer version of the X11 extension “XRANDR” than nxagent 3.5.0.x provides (version 1.2).nxagent offers “XRANDR” 1.5 now, so this no longer a problem.
  • The desktop environment checks for a specific physical graphics driver, but nxagent doesn't use physical graphics adapters/drivers.

Ultimately, addressing issues #1 and #2 requires a lot of work. Solutions are discussed here.

It is recommended to switch to using a compatible desktop environment if your desktop environment is listed below as incompatible.

Always Compatible and no Workarounds Required

  • LXDE (not LXQt)
  • XFCE
There exists a bug in either XFCE or X2Go causing rendering issues with the compositor when using X2Go.

Workaround is to disable compositing:

/usr/bin/xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p /general/use_compositing -s false
  • MATE
MATE (the fork of GNOME2) is not included with certain distros, such as Ubuntu 12.04 and Ubuntu 14.04. You can however install it from http://mate-desktop.org/ on those 2 versions of Ubuntu and on other distros.
Ubuntu 14.04 includes some MATE packages, but not enough of them to provide the MATE desktop environment. See the above note about installing MATE on Ubuntu 14.04.

Always Compatible, but Trivial Workarounds Required

  • IceWM

In X2Go Client, you must specify the Session Type as: Custom Desktop: icewm-session

  • OpenBox

In X2Go Client, You must specify the Session Type as: Custom Desktop: openbox-session

Compatibility and Workarounds depend on what version

GNOME

  • GNOME 2: Compatible and no workaround required
  • GNOME 3.0 through 3.6: “GNOME Fallback Mode” must be installed. This is included with most, if not all distros.
  • GNOME 3.8: “GNOME Flasback Mode” 3.8.x must be installed. It is seldom included with distros. There are bugs with it. Using GNOME 3.8 with X2Go is not recommended.
  • GNOME 3.10: “GNOME Flasback Mode” 3.8.x may be compatible, but there are even more bugs with it. It is seldom included with distros. Using GNOME 3.10 with X2Go is not recommended.
  • GNOME 3.12 and later: TBD, but probably not compatible. Using GNOME 3.12 and later with X2Go is not recommended.
GNOME Classic Mode is not the same as GNOME fallback mode or GNOME Flashback mode. GNOME Classic Mode is not compatible with X2Go.
We might be able to support Gnome 3.14, especially for RHEL7/EPEL7, given enough $$$ and round tuits (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/round_tuit), but support for newer versions seems doubtful, due to certain design decisions made by the Gnome developers.

KDE

  • KDE 3: Compatible and no workaround required
  • KDE 4: Compatible and no workaround required
  • KDE 5: Incompatible due to plasmashell requiring GLX 1.3 We have received several reports that KDE 5 now works with X2Go, even though it takes a long time to initialize the session. If you're interested in running KDE 5 via X2Go and run into issues, please join the X2Go-User Mailing List or, if you are certain you've found a bug, subscribe to X2Go-Dev and file a bug report.

For better performance you should set Backend=XRender and GraphicsSystem=native and XRenderSmoothScale=false in the [Compositing] section of the kwinrc (usually residing in .kde/share/config).

UNITY

  1. Ubuntu 12.04: Compatible, as long as package “unity-2d” is installed. By default with “Ubuntu Desktop”, it is.
  2. Ubuntu 12.10 and later (including 14.04): Not compatible

Cinnamon

  1. Cinnamon 1.4 (Linux Mint 13 “Maya”): Compatible, you must specify the Session Type as: Custom Desktop: gnome-session-cinnamon
  2. Cinnamon 2.2 (Linux Mint 17 “Qiana”): Not compatible. Cinnamon reverts to “fallback mode”, which is not as good as regular “cinnamon” nor “cinnamon2d”. If you wish try try it in anyway, specify the Session Type as: Custom Desktop: cinnamon-session-cinnamon2d

Compatibility issues with Cinnamon are being tracked in bug 150

Incompatible

  1. LXQt due to Qt5 incompatibility

Compatibility and Workarounds TBD

Enlightenment

  1. E17 (Bodhi Linux 24.0, “enlightenment” package version: 20130818-1)

In X2Go Client, You must specify the Session Type as: Custom Desktop: /usr/bin/enlightenment_start

However, bug 555 (Windows cannot be moved by dragging) was encountered, and not much testing has been done.

doc/de-compat.txt · Last modified: 2023/01/25 15:44 by uli42