gitlab .freedesktop .org /xorg /xserver X.Org Server is the free and open-source implementation of the X Window System (X11) display server stewarded by the X.Org Foundation . Implementations of the client-side X Window System protocol exist in the form of X11 libraries , which serve as helpful APIs for communicating with the X server. [ 4 ] Two such major X libraries exist for X11. The first of these libraries was Xlib , the original C language X11 API, [ 5 ] but another C language X library, XCB , was created later in 2001. [ 6 ] Other smaller X libraries exist, both as interfaces for Xlib and XCB in other languages, and as smaller standalone X libraries. [ citation needed ] The services with which the X.Org Foundation supports X Server include the packaging of the releases; certification (for a fee); evaluation of improvements to the code; developing the web site, and handling the distribution of monetary donations. [ citation needed ] The releases are coded, documented, and packaged by global developers . [ clarification needed ] Software architecture The X.Org Server implements the server side of the X Window System core protocol version 11 (X11) and extensions to it, e.g. RandR. [ 7 ] Version 1.16.0 integrates support for systemd -based launching and management which improved boot performance and reliability. [ 8 ] Device Independent X (DIX) The Device Independent X (DIX) is the part of the X.Org Server that interacts with clients and implements software rendering. The main loop and the event delivery are part of the DIX. [ 9 ] An X server has a tremendous amount of functionality that must be implemented to support the X core protocol. This includes code tables, glyph rasterization and caching, XLFDs , and the core rendering API which draws graphics primitives. Device Dependent X (DDX) The Device Dependent X (DDX) is the part of the x-server that interacts with the hardware. In the X.Org Server source code, each directory under "hw" corresponds to one DDX. Hardware comprises graphics cards as well as mouse and keyboards. Each driver is hardware specific and implemented as a separate loadable module. 2D graphics driver For historical reasons the X.Org Server still contains graphics device drivers supporting some form of 2D rendering acceleration. In the past, mode-setting was done by an X-server graphics device driver specific to some video controller hardware ( e.g. , a GPU ). To this mode-setting functionality, additional support for 2D acceleration was added when such became available with various GPUs. The mode-setting functionality was moved into the DRM and is being exposed through a DRM mode-setting interface, the new approach being called "kernel mode-setting" (KMS). But the 2D rendering acceleration remained. In Debian the 2D graphics drivers for the X.Org Server are packaged individually and called xserver-xorg-video-* . [ 10 ] After installation the 2D graphics driver-file is found under /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/ . The package xserver-xorg-video-nouveau installs nouveau_drv.so with a size of 215 KiB, the proprietary Nvidia GeForce driver installs an 8 MiB-sized file called nvidia_drv.so and Radeon Software installs fglrx_drv.so with a size of about 25MiB. The available free and open-source graphics device drivers are being developed inside of the Mesa 3D -project. While these can be recompiled as required, the development of the proprietary DDX 2D graphics drivers is greatly eased when the X.Org Server keeps a stable API/ABI across multiple of its versions. With version 1.17 a generic method for mode-setting was mainlined. The xf86-video-modesetting package, the Debian-package being called xserver-xorg-video-modesetting , was retired, and the generic modesetting DDX it contained was moved into the server package to become the KMS-enabled default DDX, supporting the vast majority of AMD, Intel and NVidia GPUs. On April 7, 2016, AMD employee Michel Dänzer released xf86-video-ati version 7.7.0 [ 11 ] and xf86-video-amdgpu version 1.1.0, [ 12 ] the latter including support for their Polaris microarchitecture. There are (at least) XAA (XFree86 Acceleration Architecture), [ 13 ] EXA , UXA and SNA . In the X Window System , XFree86 Acceleration Architecture ( XAA ) is a driver architecture to make a video card's 2D hardware acceleration available to the X server. [ 14 ] [ 15 ] It was written by Harm Hanemaayer in 1996 and first released in XFree86 version 3.3. It was completely rewritten for XFree86 4.0. [ 16 ] It was removed again from X.Org Server 1.13. Most drivers implement acceleration using the XAA module. XAA is on by default, though acceleration of individual functions can be switched off as needed in the server configuration file ( XF86Config or xorg.conf ). The driver for the ARK chipset was the original development platform for XAA. In X.Org Server release 6.9/7.0, EXA was released as a replacement for XAA, as XAA supplies almost no speed advantage for current video cards. EXA is regarded as an intermediate step to converting the entire X server to using OpenGL . Glamor is a generic, hardware independent, 2D acceleration driver for the X server that translates the X render primitives into OpenGL operations, taking advantage of any existing 3D OpenGL drivers. [ 17 ] In this way, it is functionally similar to Quartz Extreme and QuartzGL (2D performance acceleration) for Apple Quartz Compositor . The ultimate goal of GLAMOR is to obsolete and replace all the DDX 2D graphics device drivers and acceleration architectures, thereby avoiding the need to write X 2D specific drivers for every supported graphic chipset. [ 18 ] [ 19 ] [ 20 ] Glamor requires a 3D driver with support for shaders . [ 21 ] Glamor performance tuning was accepted for Google Summer of Code 2014. [ 22 ] Glamor supports Xephyr and DRI3 , [ 23 ] and can boost some operations by 700–800%. [ 24 ] Since its mainlining into version 1.16 of the X.Org Server, development on Glamor was continued and patches for the 1.17 release were published. [ 25 ] There is a distinct and special DDX for instances of the X.Org Server which run on a guest system inside of a virtualized environment : xf86-video-qxl, a driver for the "QXL video device". SPICE makes use of this driver though it works without it as well. In the Debian repositories it is called xserver-xorg-video-qxl . Under Debian, drivers related to input are found under /usr/lib/xorg/modules/input/ . Such drivers are named e.g. evdev_drv.so , mouse_drv.so , synaptics_drv.so or wacom_drv.so . With version 1.16, the X.Org Server obtained support for the libinput library in form of a wrapper called xf86-input-libinput . [ 26 ] At the XDC 2015 in Toronto, libratbag was introduced as a generic library to support configurable mice. [ 27 ] [ 28 ] xserver-xorg-input-joystick is the input module for the X.Org server to handle classic joysticks and gamepads, which is not meant for playing games under X, but to control the cursor with a joystick or gamepad. [ 29 ] [ 30 ] Other DDX components The X.Org Server, and any x-client, each run as distinct processes. On Unix/Linux, a process knows nothing about any other processes. For it to communicate with another process, it is completely and utterly reliant on the kernel to moderate the communication via available inter-process communication (IPC) mechanisms. Unix domain sockets are used to communicate with processes running on the same machine. Special socket function calls are part of the System Call Interface. Although Internet domain sockets can be used locally, Unix domain sockets are more efficient, since they do not have the protocol overhead ( checksums , byte orders, etc.). X.Org Server does not use D-Bus . Sockets are the most common interprocess communication (IPC) method between the processes of the X server and its various X clients. It provides the Application Programming Interface (API) for communication in the TCP/IP domain and also locally only in the UNIX domain. There are several other APIs described in the X Transport Interface, for instance TLI (Transport Layer Interface). Other options for IPC between for the X client-server, require X Window system extensions, for instance the MIT Shared Memory Extension (MIT-SHM) . Multiseat configuration Multi-seat refers to an assembly of a single computer with multiple "seats", allowing multiple users to sit down at the computer, log in, and use the computer at the same time independently. The computer has multiple keyboards, mice, and monitors attached to it, each "seat" having one keyboard, one mouse and one monitor assigned to it. A "seat" consists of all hardware devices assigned to a specific workplace. It consists of at least one graphics device (graphics card or just an output and the attached monitor) and a keyboard and a mouse. It can also include video cameras, sound cards and more. Due to limitation of the VT system in the Linux kernel and of the X core protocol (in particular, how X defines the relation between the root window and an output of the graphics card), multi-seat does not work out-of-the-box for the usual Linux distribution but necessitates a special configuration. There are these methods to configure a multi-seat assembly: multiple Xephyr servers over a host xorg-server multiple instances of an xorg-server one graphics card per seat a single graphics card for all seats one graphics card per seat a single graphics card for all seats The utilized command-line options of the xorg-server are: -isolateDevice bus-id Restrict device resets (output) to the device at bus-id. The bus-id string has the form bustype:bus:device:function (e.g., 'PCI:1:0:0'). At present, only isolation of PCI devices is supported; i.e., this option is ignored if bustype is anything other than 'PCI'. vtXX the default for e.g. Debian 9 Stretch is 7, i.e. by pressing Ctrl + Alt + F7 the user can switch to the VT running the xorg-server. Only the user on the first monitor has the use of vt consoles and can use Ctrl + Alt + F x to select them. The other users have a GDM login screen and can use xorg-server normally, but have no vt's. Even though a single user can utilize multiple monitors connected to the different ports of a single graphics card (cf. RandR), the method which is based on multiple instances of the xorg-server seems to require multiple PCI graphics cards. It is possible to configure multi-seat employing only one graphics card, but due to limitations of the X protocol this necessitates the usage of X Display Manager Control Protocol XDMCP. [ 37 ] There is also Xdmx (Distributed Multihead X). The modern X.Org Foundation came into being in 2004 when the body that oversaw X standards and published the official reference implementation joined forces with former XFree86 developers. [ 43 ] X11R6.7.0, the first version of the X.Org Server, was forked from XFree86 4.4 RC2. [ 1 ] The immediate reason for the fork was a disagreement with the new license for the final release version of XFree86 4.4, but several disagreements among the contributors surfaced prior to the split. Many of the previous XFree86 developers have joined the X.Org Server project. In 2005, a great effort was put in the modularization of the X.Org server source code, [ 44 ] resulting in a dual release by the end of the year. The X11R7.0.0 release added a new modular build system based on the GNU Autotools , while X11R6.9.0 kept the old imake build system, both releases sharing the same codebase. Since then the X11R6.9 branch is maintained frozen and all the ongoing development is done to the modular branch. The new build system also brought the use of dlloader standard dynamic linker to load plugins and drivers, deprecating the old own method. As a consequence of the modularization, the X11 binaries were moving out of their own /usr/X11R6 subdirectory tree and into the global /usr tree on many Unix systems. In June 2006, another effort was done to move the X.Org server source codebase from CVS to git . [ 45 ] Both efforts had the long-term goal of bringing new developers to the project. In the words of Alan Coopersmith: [ 46 ] Some of our efforts here have been technological – one of the driving efforts of the conversions from Imake to automake and from CVS to git was to make use of tools developers would already be familiar and productive with from other projects. The Modularization project, which broke up X.Org from one giant tree into over 200 small ones, had the goal of making it possible to fix a bug in a single library or driver without having to download and build many megabytes of software & fonts that were not being changed. In the 7.1 release, the KDrive framework (a small implementation of X written by Keith Packard , which was not based on XFree86 that X.Org developers used as a testing ground for new ideas, such as EXA ) was integrated into the main codebase of X.Org server. In 2008, the new DRI2, based on the kernel mode-setting (KMS) driver, replaced DRI. This change also set a major milestone in the X.Org server architecture, as the drivers were moved out from the server and user space (UMS) to the kernel space . In 2013, the initial versions of DRI3 and Present extensions were written and coded by Keith Packard to provide a faster and tearing -free 2D rendering. By the end of the year the implementation of GLX was rewritten by Adam Jackson at Red Hat . [ 47 ] In June 2025, a fork of X.Org Server called XLibre was released. [ 48 ] [ 49 ] Free and open-source software portal Reference implementation – part of a standard release package X window manager – a package that is deliberately kept separate from the X server package X video extension XQuartz – An X server for macOS Xming – An X server for Windows 1 2 "X.Org Foundation releases X Window System X11R6.7" . LWN.net . 7 April 2004 . Retrieved 4 April 2012 . ↑ Peter Hutterer (8 July 2026). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 21.1.24" . Retrieved 8 July 2026 . ↑ "Debian X.Org Server Package in sid" . ↑ "Xlib and XCB" . ↑ "Xlib and XCB" . ↑ "Xlib and XCB" . ↑ "git: xorg-server, RandR" . 1 2 3 "ANNOUNCE: xorg-server 1.16.0" . freedesktop.org . 17 July 2014. ↑ "Glossary" . X.org . ↑ "Details of package xserver-xorg-video-nouveau in stretch" . packages.debian.org . ↑ " [ ANNOUNCE ] xf86-video-ati 7.7.0" . 7 April 2016. ↑ " [ ANNOUNCE ] xf86-video-amdgpu 1.1.0" . 7 April 2016. ↑ "Information for ARK Logic Chipset Users: Acceleration" . XFree86.org . Archived from the original on 23 June 2018 . Retrieved 22 September 2018 . ↑ Anholt, Eric. "High Performance X Servers in the Kdrive Architecture" . www.usenix.org . Retrieved 14 September 2018 . ↑ Wetzel, Robert. "An acceleration architecture for DOpE" (PDF) . wwwos.inf.tu-dresden.de . Retrieved 14 September 2018 . ↑ "Release Notes for XFree86 4.0" . XFree86 Project . 7 March 2000 . Retrieved 16 September 2018 . ↑ "What is Glamor?" . FreeDesktop.org . Retrieved 10 February 2014 . ↑ Anholt, Eric. "Building 2D rendering acceleration with OpenGL" . linux.conf.au . Archived from the original on 4 March 2016 . Retrieved 10 February 2014 . ↑ Packard, Keith. "Brief Glamor Hacks" . Retrieved 7 March 2014 . ↑ "Adam Jackson – GLX rewrite" . 24 September 2013 . Retrieved 23 March 2014 . ↑ "Radeon Feature Matrix" . freedesktop.org . ↑ "Glamor Performance Tuning" . Archived from the original on 24 September 2015 . Retrieved 22 April 2014 . ↑ "GLAMOR Xephyr & DRI3 Support Called For Pulling" . Phoronix . 5 March 2014. ↑ "GLAMOR Patch Bomb Can Boost Some Operations By 700~800%" . Phoronix . 13 March 2014. ↑ "glamor changes for 1.17" . 17 July 2014. ↑ Hutterer, Peter (24 September 2014). "libinput – a common input stack for Wayland compositors and X.Org drivers" . ↑ "libratbag" . X.org . ↑ "Tools to debug a broken input device" . X.org . ↑ "XDC2012: xorg-input-joystick" (PDF) (pdf). ↑ "Details of package xserver-xorg-input-joystick in buster" . packages.debian.org . ↑ "X Clients under Wayland (XWayland)" . Wayland Project. Archived from the original on 9 February 2014 . Retrieved 10 February 2014 . ↑ "Wayland" . Arch Linux Project . Retrieved 9 May 2016 . ↑ "XSpice README" . Cgit.freedesktop.org . Retrieved 25 October 2013 . ↑ "The X Resize, Rotate and Reflect Extension Version 1.3.1" .

↑ Tyler, Chris (2008). X Power Tools . O'Reilly Media, Inc. pp. 86– 87. ISBN 9780596101954 . Retrieved 14 September 2018 . ↑ Gultsch, Daniel (2009). "Dual Image » Linux Magazine" . Linux Magazine (106). ↑ "MultiseatOneCard – Community Help Wiki" . help.ubuntu.com . ↑ "VcXsrv Windows X Server" . Github.com . Retrieved 7 February 2024 . ↑ "VcXsrv Windows X Server" . SourceForge.net . Retrieved 23 June 2013 . Windows X-server based on the xorg git sources (like xming or cygwin's xwin), but compiled with Visual C++ 2010. ↑ Re: Xorg in Leopard? Archived 13 February 2012 at the Wayback Machine , From: Ben Byer, Date: 29 June 2007, Apple Mailing Lists ↑ Slivka, Eric (17 February 2012). "Apple Removes X11 in OS X Mountain Lion, Shifts Support to Open Source XQuartz" . MacRumors . Retrieved 23 February 2012 . ↑ "Software Product Description and QuickSpecs – VSI OpenVMS Version 8.4-2L1 for Integrity servers" (PDF) . VMS Software Inc. July 2019 . Retrieved 2 January 2021 . ↑ Coopersmith, Alan (28 May 2004). "The difference between Xorg and XFree86" . Archived from the original on 17 September 2018 . Retrieved 17 September 2018 . ↑ "X.Org Foundation Modularization Working Group" . X.Org Foundation . Retrieved 6 February 2014 . ↑ Høgsberg, Kristian (July 2006). "Doing git migration now" . Retrieved 6 February 2014 . ↑ Coopersmith, Alan. "Some times it's a book sprint, other times it's a marathon" . Archived from the original on 12 January 2019 . Retrieved 12 January 2019 . ↑ "The X.Org Server's GLX Is Being Rewritten" . 26 October 2013. ↑ Borisov, Bobby (7 June 2025). "XLibre Xserver: Banned by Red Hat Developer Plans Revival of X11" . Linuxiac . Retrieved 22 October 2025 . ↑ "XLibre 25.0 Released As Inaugural Version Of X.Org Server Fork" . Phoronix . Retrieved 29 October 2025 . ↑ "X11R6.9 and X11R7.0 Officially Released" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Jackson, Adam (22 May 2006). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.1.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ "Summary of new features in X11R7.1" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Jackson, Adam (23 January 2007). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xserver 1.2.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ "X11R7.2 Release" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (20 April 2007). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.3.0.0 again" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (5 March 2007). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.2.99.901 (X server 1.3 RC1)" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . 1 2 Anholt, Eric (6 September 2007). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.4" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ "X server version 1.4 release plans" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Jackson, Adam (3 September 2008). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xserver 1.5.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ "MPX has been merged" . 26 May 2008. ↑ Packard, Keith (25 February 2009). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.6.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ "Server 1.6 branch" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Hutterer, Peter (2 October 2009). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.7.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ "Server 1.7 branch" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Larabel, Michael. "X Server 1.7 Released With XI2/MPX Glory" . Phoronix . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (2 April 2010). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.8.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Larabel, Michael. "X.Org Server 1.8.0 Is Here" . Phoronix . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (21 August 2010). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.9.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (26 February 2011). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.10.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Larabel, Michael. "That Was Quick, X Server 1.10 Officially Released" . Phoronix . Retrieved 8 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (27 August 2011). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.11.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (5 March 2012). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.12.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Larabel, Michael. "X.Org Server 1.12 Released With Multi-Touch" . Phoronix . Retrieved 8 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (5 September 2012). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.13.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Larabel, Michael. "X.Org Server 1.13 Released With Massive Changes" . Phoronix . Retrieved 8 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (6 March 2013). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.14.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (19 December 2012). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.13.99.901 (1.14 RC1)" . X.org . Retrieved 9 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (27 December 2013). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.15.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (November 2013). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.14.99.901" . X.org . Retrieved 9 February 2015 . ↑ Larabel, Michael. "X.Org Server 1.15 Release Has Several New Features" . Phoronix . Retrieved 9 February 2015 . 1 2 Packard, Keith (17 July 2014). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.16.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Larabel, Michael. "X.Org Server 1.16 Officially Released With Terrific Features" . Phoronix . Retrieved 9 February 2015 . ↑ Hutterer, Peter (24 September 2014). "libinput – a common input stack for Wayland compositors and X.Org drivers" . Retrieved 17 April 2016 . ↑ de Goede, Hans (1 February 2015). "Replacing xorg input – Drivers with libinput" (PDF) . Retrieved 18 April 2016 . ↑ Packard, Keith (4 February 2015). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.17.0" . X.org . Retrieved 7 February 2015 . ↑ Packard, Keith (29 October 2014). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.16.99.901" . X.org . Retrieved 9 February 2015 . ↑ Larabel, Michael. "X.Org Server 1.17 Officially Released" . Phoronix . Retrieved 9 February 2015 . ↑ Jackson, Adam (9 November 2015). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.18.0" . xorg-announce (Mailing list). ↑ Packard, Keith (15 November 2016). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.19.0" . xorg-announce (Mailing list). ↑ Larabel, Michael. "X.Org Server 1.19 Officially Released With A Year's Worth Of Improvements" . Phoronix . Retrieved 15 November 2016 . ↑ Jackson, Adam (10 May 2018). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 1.20" . xorg-announce (Mailing list). ↑ Kanapickas, Povilas (27 October 2021). " [ ANNOUNCE ] xorg-server 21.1.0" . xorg-announce (Mailing list). Official website VcXsrv – a fully updated X server for Windows VcXsrv – SourceForge old repository for Windows X11 color names X Image Extension X keyboard extension X Rendering Extension Shape extension Shared memory extension X Display Manager Control Protocol X video extension X-Video Motion Compensation Multi-Pointer X Display PostScript Composite Extension X Toolkit Intrinsics freedesktop.org Desktop environments (comparison) X.Org Server Glamor Video Acceleration API Open Collaboration Services (OCS) Portland Project Freedesktop.org Software that uses Meson Articles with short description Short description is different from Wikidata Articles needing additional references from July 2017 All articles needing additional references Articles lacking reliable references from July 2017 All articles lacking reliable references Articles with multiple maintenance issues Use dmy dates from August 2015 All articles with unsourced statements Articles with unsourced statements from August 2022 Articles with unsourced statements from September 2011 Wikipedia articles needing clarification from January 2012 Webarchive template wayback links Commons category link from Wikidata Official website different in Wikidata and Wikipedia