Kubuntu 25.10 Drops X11 Session for Wayland-Only Install
Kubuntu 25.10 will not ship with an X11 desktop session on its ISO, following Ubuntu's lead. An X11 Plasma session will remain available for manual install.
On the one hand that means future Kubuntus (for a while) won't have remote desktop, remote UI commands, global hotkeys, nor other such useful features. Or, heck, won't have accessibility. On the other hand, from the progress I've seen KDE are among the better positioned to change that, so who knows. Prepping for a Kubuntu LTS?
On the third hand, it's still Ubuntu. The Wayland fixes are probably going to be shipped as snaps for the Pro version.
KDE already has remote desktop and global shortcuts implemented. It's applications that are lacking proper Wayland support.
The remote desktop is only RDP and VNC with the built in server.
There is no API for easily starting or managing a desktop session
the problem now is that while kde and gnome do have most of those things on wayland, it's all bespoke. there are no universal wayland remote desktop systems or accessibility pushes, just "the gnome one" and "the kde one".
it's fragmenting the desktop.
What we need is a remote session API
I don't see that happening though
That has always been my main criticism about wayland: it's actually vaporware.
It's just a spec (and not even a complete one) that says "now, you go do our work and implement all this". So everyone has to go and do their own thing, which is the usual big corpo strategy to kill small corpo and/or FOSS. So I wonder why don't people see it. Pulseaudio, wayland, systemd, all came in at about the same time as the "microsoftism" infection in Linux development.
From what I recall, for the first 5-or-so years there was not even a reference implementation (and I don't know if that is still the case, but do would expect it is).
KDE does have remote desktop support
@lambalicious @tonytins KBUNTU will, KDE is NOT eliminating X.
This is going to be an interesting shake up, to say the least.
Thing is, there's no real software KVM (or rather KM) solution for Wayland. Barrier (and the others) works only on X11.
It's a minor thing, but unfortunately major enough for me to be unable to switch to Wayland at all.
Completely dropping X11 sounds a nightmare in my case. I'm not against dropping X11, if Wayland proves to be a better alternative. But not with "holes" like this. :c
Given the push for Wayland adoption and the dropping of Xorg, this is not surprising. In fact they chose a good time to do this as more testing can be done before 26.04 is finalized and deployed to end users.
@tonytins Ubuntu-Mate however will. But really it does not matter if it is included by default as long as it is installable.
Rest in peace Kubuntu.
73% of plasma 6 installs with telemetry enabled are using Wayland
I think that the fantasy of X11 sticking around forever is sweet, but the writing is on the wall.