Techrights

Start X

Posted by Roy Schestowitz on Jun 28, 2025

Before there was a "free software foundation" there was already UNIX. Although the X.Org Foundation was founded just over 21 years ago the X Window System was first released in 1984, about half a year after the original GNU announcement (followed by its Manifesto). Both GNU and X started at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). X was part of the Project Athena, which was launched in 1983 with support from Digital Equipment Corporation and IBM (back when IBM dominated this industry).

Richard Stallman, a young programmer at MIT at the time, tried to convince X people to join him and adopt his licence, only to meet resistance or silence. Keith Packard spoke about it 5 years ago.

After all those years GNU still works. X still works as well.

Those who try to replace both do so for the wrong reasons. Their motivations are rightly suspected by many.

Any time the "Wayland People" try to portray X "sticklers" as nazis they shoot their own foot and alienate many people. Many of those so-called "Wayland People" are IBM employees, i.e. they work for a company that actually worked for the actual nazis (for profit, too). IBM does not seem to care about people who have or will have disabilities (the latter group is most of us). They're just a "burden" on IBM's business model.

Many people will continue to use X for many years to come. If some distribution or desktop environment or application lacks support for X, users will simply abandon or reject it a priori.

Just because something is old does not mean it is bad. In many case it means it has 1) matured and 2) endured the "test of time". If many people still use optical drives, "spinning rust", backup tapes/spools, AAA batteries and "classic" headphones (not complicated ports), it's not because they are "nazis"; they are pragmatic people who recognise what works, not what has the latest DRM and planned obsolescence. █