Build wayland/weston on Ubuntu-22.04/24.04

Verified on WSL2 and VMware Machine.

Downloading the code

mkdir -p $HOME/workspace
cd $HOME/workspace
git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/sepnic/gfx-wayland.git

Installing system dependencies

sudo apt-get install cmake build-essential bison flex autoconf meson libncurses-dev \
    hwdata python3-pip python3-mako pkg-config

sudo apt-get install libxml2-dev libffi-dev libudev-dev libevdev-dev libmtdev-dev \
    libpciaccess-dev libpng-dev libfontconfig1-dev libglib2.0-dev libelf-dev \
    libsystemd-dev libpam0g-dev libwaffle-dev qtbase5-dev \
    libegl1-mesa-dev libgles2-mesa-dev glslang-tools

## Update meson if "ERROR: Meson version is 0.61.2 but project requires >= 1.3.0"
pip3 install meson==1.3.0

Setting up the environment

Setup custom installation path to not disturb the default linux installation. Setup needed environment settings without impacting your overall system settings. You can add this in your .bashrc file. Note that gfx_wayland_setup need to be run in any terminal you want to launch these costom build components.

function gfx_wayland_setup() {
    export GFX_TOP=$HOME/workspace/gfx-wayland
    export GFX_SOURCE=$GFX_TOP/src
    export GFX_INSTALL=$GFX_TOP/out
    export EGL_PLATFORM=wayland
    export XDG_CONFIG_DIRS=$XDG_CONFIG_DIRS:$GFX_INSTALL/etc/xdg
    export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$GFX_INSTALL/lib:$GFX_INSTALL/lib/$(uname -m)-linux-gnu:$GFX_INSTALL/lib/$(uname -m)-linux-gnu/dri
    export LIBRARY_PATH=$GFX_INSTALL/lib:$LIBRARY_PATH
    export PKG_CONFIG_PATH=$GFX_INSTALL/share/pkgconfig:$GFX_INSTALL/lib/pkgconfig:$GFX_INSTALL/lib64/pkgconfig:$GFX_INSTALL/lib/$(uname -m)-linux-gnu/pkgconfig
    export PATH=$GFX_INSTALL:$GFX_INSTALL/bin:$PATH
    export ACLOCAL_PATH=$GFX_INSTALL/share/aclocal
    export ACLOCAL="aclocal -I $ACLOCAL_PATH"
    export C_INCLUDE_PATH=$GFX_INSTALL/include
    export CPLUS_INCLUDE_PATH=$GFX_INSTALL/include
    export LC_ALL=en_US.UTF8
}

If seeing below errors when running weston on WSL Ubuntu-24.04

[11:19:34.741] Loading module '/home/sep/workspace/gfx-wayland/out/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libweston-13/wayland-backend.so'
[11:19:34.742] Error: Failed to connect to parent Wayland compositor: No such file or directory
               display option: (none), WAYLAND_DISPLAY=wayland-0
[11:19:34.742] fatal: failed to create compositor backend

here is a workaround (refer to microsoft/WSL#11261)

ln -s /mnt/wslg/runtime-dir/wayland-0* /run/user/1000/

Building wayland/weston

Wayland

cd $GFX_SOURCE/wayland/
meson $GFX_INSTALL/build/wayland --prefix=$GFX_INSTALL -Ddocumentation=false -Ddtd_validation=false
ninja -C $GFX_INSTALL/build/wayland install

Wayland-protocols

cd $GFX_SOURCE/wayland-protocols/
meson $GFX_INSTALL/build/wayland-protocols --prefix=$GFX_INSTALL
ninja -C $GFX_INSTALL/build/wayland-protocols install

Seatd

cd $GFX_SOURCE/seatd/
meson $GFX_INSTALL/build/seatd --prefix=$GFX_INSTALL -Dlibseat-builtin=enabled -Dman-pages=disabled
ninja -C $GFX_INSTALL/build/seatd install

libxkbcommon

cd $GFX_SOURCE/libxkbcommon/
meson $GFX_INSTALL/build/libxkbcommon --prefix=$GFX_INSTALL \
    -Dbash-completion-path=$GFX_INSTALL/bin \
    -Denable-x11=false \
    -Dxkb-config-root=/usr/share/X11/xkb \
    -Dx-locale-root=/usr/share/X11/locale \
    -Denable-docs=false
ninja -C $GFX_INSTALL/build/libxkbcommon install

libinput

cd $GFX_SOURCE/libinput/
meson $GFX_INSTALL/build/libinput --prefix=$GFX_INSTALL \
    -Dlibwacom=false -Ddebug-gui=false -Dtests=false -Dinstall-tests=false
ninja -C $GFX_INSTALL/build/libinput install

libdrm

cd $GFX_SOURCE/libdrm/
meson $GFX_INSTALL/build/libdrm --prefix=$GFX_INSTALL \
    -Dintel=enabled -Dradeon=enabled -Damdgpu=enabled -Dnouveau=enabled \
    -Dvmwgfx=enabled -Domap=enabled -Dexynos=enabled -Dfreedreno=enabled \
    -Dtegra=enabled -Dvc4=enabled -Detnaviv=enabled \
    -Dcairo-tests=disabled -Dman-pages=disabled -Dvalgrind=disabled
ninja -C $GFX_INSTALL/build/libdrm install

Pixman

cd $GFX_SOURCE/pixman/
meson $GFX_INSTALL/build/pixman --prefix=$GFX_INSTALL \
    -Dloongson-mmi=disabled -Dmmx=disabled -Dmips-dspr2=disabled \
    -Dvmx=disabled -Dgtk=disabled -Drvv=disabled -Dlibpng=disabled
ninja -C $GFX_INSTALL/build/pixman install

Cairo

cd $GFX_SOURCE/cairo/
meson $GFX_INSTALL/build/cairo --prefix=$GFX_INSTALL \
    -Dtests=disabled -Dgtk2-utils=disabled -Dsymbol-lookup=disabled -Dgtk_doc=false
ninja -C $GFX_INSTALL/build/cairo install

libdisplay-info

cd $GFX_SOURCE/libdisplay-info/
meson $GFX_INSTALL/build/libdisplay-info --prefix=$GFX_INSTALL
ninja -C $GFX_INSTALL/build/libdisplay-info install

Weston

cd $GFX_SOURCE/weston/
meson $GFX_INSTALL/build/weston --prefix=$GFX_INSTALL \
    -Drenderer-gl=true -Drenderer-vulkan=true \
    -Dshell-desktop=true -Dshell-ivi=true -Dshell-lua=false \
    -Dbackend-drm=true -Dbackend-wayland=true -Dbackend-headless=true \
    -Dbackend-drm-screencast-vaapi=false -Dbackend-rdp=false \
    -Dbackend-x11=false -Dbackend-pipewire=false -Dbackend-vnc=false \
    -Dxwayland=false -Dremoting=false -Dpipewire=false \
    -Dcolor-management-lcms=false -Dimage-jpeg=false -Dimage-webp=false \
    -Ddemo-clients=false -Dtest-junit-xml=false
ninja -C $GFX_INSTALL/build/weston install

apitrace

mkdir -p $GFX_INSTALL/build/apitrace
cd $GFX_INSTALL/build/apitrace
cmake $GFX_SOURCE/apitrace -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=$GFX_INSTALL \
    -DENABLE_STATIC_LIBGCC=OFF -DENABLE_STATIC_LIBSTDCXX=OFF \
    -DENABLE_X11=OFF -DENABLE_EGL=ON \
    -DENABLE_WAFFLE=ON -DBUILD_TESTING=OFF
make
make install

nvtop

mkdir -p $GFX_INSTALL/build/nvtop
cd $GFX_INSTALL/build/nvtop
cmake $GFX_SOURCE/nvtop -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=$GFX_INSTALL
make
make install

Running weston and wayland-client

Opening Terminal A to launch wayland-server:

gfx_wayland_setup
$GFX_INSTALL/bin/weston --debug --shell=desktop-shell.so

Opening Terminal B to launch wayland-client:

gfx_wayland_setup
WAYLAND_DISPLAY=wayland-1 $GFX_INSTALL/bin/weston-simple-egl

Using apitrace to trace egl/gl API calls, for example, trace egl calls of weston-simple-egl:

gfx_wayland_setup
WAYLAND_DISPLAY=wayland-1 $GFX_INSTALL/bin/apitrace trace --api=egl $GFX_INSTALL/bin/weston-simple-egl
$GFX_INSTALL/bin/apitrace dump weston-simple-egl.trace > weston-simple-egl.txt
cat weston-simple-egl.txt

Using qapitrace(apitrace-gui tool) to view an existing trace:

gfx_wayland_setup
$GFX_INSTALL/bin/qapitrace weston-simple-egl.trace

Using apitrace to replay with an existing trace:

gfx_wayland_setup
WAFFLE_PLATFORM=wayland $GFX_INSTALL/bin/apitrace replay weston-simple-egl.trace

Using nvtop to monitor GPU runtime information:

gfx_wayland_setup
$GFX_INSTALL/bin/nvtop

Reference

• https://docs.mesa3d.org/install.html
• https://wayland.freedesktop.org/building.html
• https://devblogs.microsoft.com/commandline/d3d12-gpu-video-acceleration-in-the-windows-subsystem-for-linux-now-available/
• https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/mesa/mesa
• https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/wayland/weston