cinnamon-common ships the "Cinnamon on Wayland (Experimental)" session
(`/usr/share/wayland-sessions/cinnamon-wayland.desktop` and the matching
`cinnamon-wayland.session`), but nothing in the Cinnamon packaging pulls xwayland in — it
only appears in the build dependencies of muffin, for the test suite. With `apt-get
install -s`, on unstable and on trixie alike, neither `cinnamon` nor
`cinnamon-desktop-environment` nor `task-cinnamon-desktop` installs it, recommends
included, while `task-gnome-desktop` does.

Without XWayland that session comes up with a black desktop. DISPLAY is exported into the
session all the same, so nemo-desktop — an X11 client — dies at once with "Cannot open
display", and with it go the wallpaper, the desktop icons and the desktop context menu.
Installing the xwayland package and logging back in gives a normal desktop; I checked
before and after in a clean Debian 13 VM. This is also what bug #1113913 ran into, where
the black desktop was mistaken for a side effect of enabling the on-screen keyboard.

GNOME puts the relationship in the same place: gnome-session, the Architecture: all
package shipping `/usr/share/wayland-sessions/gnome.desktop`, has a plain
`Depends: xwayland`. kwin-wayland depends on it too and weston recommends it, while
libmutter only carries a Breaks — so it is the session package that declares it, not the
compositor library. cinnamon-common is our equivalent, and Architecture: all as well.

A Recommends rather than a Depends looks right here: the Wayland session is still
experimental and the X11 one has no use for XWayland.

Hello,

Bug #1147594 in cinnamon reported by you has been fixed in the
Git repository and is awaiting an upload. You can see the commit
message below and you can check the diff of the fix at:

https://salsa.debian.org/cinnamon-team/cinnamon/-/commit/7bd47ec9de2badcee3c485857b0f3f27aa80cc0a
------------------------------------------------------------------------
d/control: recommend xwayland for the Wayland session

cinnamon-common ships the "Cinnamon on Wayland (Experimental)" session
(/usr/share/wayland-sessions/cinnamon-wayland.desktop and the matching
cinnamon-wayland.session), but nothing in the Cinnamon packaging pulls
xwayland in: it only appears in the build dependencies of muffin, where
it is needed by the test suite. Installing cinnamon,
cinnamon-desktop-environment or task-cinnamon-desktop, recommends
included, never installs it, on unstable as well as on stable.

Without XWayland that session comes up with a black desktop: DISPLAY is
exported all the same, so nemo-desktop starts and immediately dies with
"Cannot open display", and with it go the wallpaper, the desktop icons
and the desktop context menu. Installing the package makes it behave
normally again. This is what Debian bug #1113913 ran into, where it was
mistaken for a side effect of turning the on-screen keyboard on.

GNOME handles it the same way and in the same place: gnome-session, the
architecture-independent package shipping
/usr/share/wayland-sessions/gnome.desktop, has a plain Depends on
xwayland. kwin-wayland depends on it too, and weston recommends it;
libmutter only carries a Breaks for the version. A Recommends is enough
here, since the Wayland session is still experimental and the X11 one
has no use for XWayland.

Closes: #1147594
Assisted-by: Claude Code:claude-opus-5
------------------------------------------------------------------------

(this message was generated automatically)
-- 
Greetings

https://bugs.debian.org/1147594