XFCE 4.20 Released With Experimental Wayland Support

The XFCE development team has released XFCE 4.20 after almost two years of work. It is a major release with lots of exciting new features. The team has added many new features and made various minor improvements. They have also fixed lots of bugs. You can download XFCE 4.20 as individual packages or as a single tarball.

Wayland Support

The biggest change in XFCE 4.20 is experimental Wayland support. Wayland is a modern display server protocol that is designed to replace the older X11 system. Wayland is designed to be simpler and more secure than X11. It offers better performance, enhanced support for HiDPI displays, and a more modern compositor-centric approach.

Most XFCE components now work on Wayland. This is a big step forward for XFCE. It means that XFCE users can now enjoy the benefits of Wayland. However, the Wayland support is still experimental. The XFCE team recommends that only advanced users try it out for now.

Related Read: Check If You're Using Wayland or X11 In Linux

Thunar Updates

Thunar, the XFCE file manager, has also been updated with a number of new features and improvements, including:

• Mount points now show an emblem and have a type description.
• Support for IPv6 remote URLs.
• You can now create symbolic links on remote locations.
• You can open the context menu on search results before the search has finished.
• New toolbar buttons, including a view switcher, a menu button, a new tab button, and a new window button.
• An option to use client-side decorations.
• An option to show the number of hidden files in the status bar.
• Only successfully opened files are added to the list of recently used files.
• Directories are no longer added to the recently used files list.
• An option to use symbolic icons in the side pane and coloured icons in the toolbar.
• Folders now open automatically when you hover over them while dragging files.
• Numerous performance improvements, making Thunar more responsive when working with many files.
• Shortcuts for custom actions now work when the custom action is located in a submenu.
• Improved file transfer dialog with fewer buttons and proper thumbnail requests.
• Trusted launchers show launcher names instead of file names by default.
• You will be asked for confirmation before any deletion is done by an undo operation.
• The list view now supports folder expansion.
• A shortcut to toggle between split-view panes and improved visual distinction between the focused pane and the unfocused pane.
• A dialog asks for confirmation when closing a split pane with multiple tabs.

Other Improvements

XFCE 4.20 also includes a number of other improvements. The team has fixed scaling for icons and thumbnails. They have also added various missing icons for larger scales. This means that XFCE should now look great on HiDPI displays.

The Exo Icon View has been improved. It can handle 100,000 files or more without freezing. The type-ahead search box in the Exo icon view always stays inside the view widget.

The libxfce4ui library has also been updated. The shortcut editor allows you to use shortcuts for multiple actions. The about dialog shows the distribution logo and information about the windowing system and GPU.

Application Updates

XFCE 4.20 also includes updates to other applications:

1. xfce4-appfinder:

• Added support for Ctrl+N / Ctrl+P navigation, automatic window closure on focus loss, and immediate command execution with Ctrl+Enter.
• Application-specific actions are now accessible via right-click.
• Generic launcher names and single-click launching options have been added.
• Appfinder can now run as a daemon for faster response times.

2. xfce4-panel:

• Panel border width is now configurable.
• The clock plugin has been enhanced, with new features for the LCD and analog clocks, including week number display and 24-hour mode.
• The show desktop plugin activates on mouse hover.
• The preferences dialog allows removing multiple panel objects simultaneously using the delete key.

3. xfce4-power-manager:

• The security tab has been removed, and lock screen management has been simplified.
• Support for power profiles via power-profiles-daemon has been added, along with options for lid-closed actions.

4. xfce4-session:

• The logout dialog no longer includes a session saving checkbox.
• A Wayland session can now be started with the command startxfce4 --wayland.

5. xfce4-settings:

• Icon themes are loaded in a separate thread, with warnings for incomplete themes.
• Client-side decorations are now opt-in, and dark theme support has been improved.
• The display settings dialog has been enhanced, with extended profile management and improved scaling and mirror state handling.
• The mouse settings dialog includes a checkbox for adaptive or flat mouse acceleration profiles, and high-resolution scrolling is supported for compatible mice.
• The MIME settings dialog allows selecting and changing multiple items simultaneously.

6. xfconf:

• A systemd user unit for the D-Bus session service has been added.
• Whitespace is now properly escaped when writing xfconf channels to disk, and xfconf-query displays array contents.

7. xfdesktop:

• Wallpaper cycling now avoids repetition until all wallpapers have been shown.
• Old Xfce backgrounds have been converted to SVG, and gradients are rendered with gamma correction.
• The desktop icon arrangement confirmation dialog is now optional. Custom icon label and background colors can be set, and the icon grid is independent for each monitor.
• Window icons are displayed on the monitor where the window was last present.
• The context menu includes additional options, and folders can be sorted before files.
• Icon positions are saved to prevent unexpected movement when monitors are added or removed.
• New files and dropped files are placed near the cursor.
• Options for displaying fixed disk and drive icons have been added.
• The desktop icons tab in the preferences dialog has been reworked, and all xfdesktop shortcuts are now configurable.
• Additional background image folders have been added as shortcuts in the settings dialog, which now updates dynamically if the background is changed externally.
• Wallpaper image folders are loaded asynchronously to prevent lag.
• Cascading custom actions are displayed correctly, and multiple selected folders can be opened simultaneously.
• The context menu opens on button press instead of release. The middle-click window list menu has new styling and features.

8. xfwm4:

• Support for stretch theme variants has been added.
• Softpipe is blocked for GLX vsync, and the skip taskbar/pager option is now included when passing focus.
• A crash when Alt-Tabbing has been fixed.

Conclusion

XFCE 4.20 is a major release that brings a lot of new features and improvements. The experimental Wayland support is a significant update, and the other improvements make XFCE even more polished and user-friendly. If you are looking for a lightweight, customizable, and reliable desktop environment, XFCE 4.20 is a great option.