Cocoa-Way – Native macOS Wayland compositor for running Linux apps seamlessly

Cocoa-Way is a native macOS Wayland compositor that enables seamless Linux app execution with low latency using Metal and OpenGL. It eliminates VM overhead and provides deep desktop integration with full HiDPI support.

Native macOS Wayland compositor for running Linux apps seamlessly

True protocol portability: Cocoa-Way rendering Linux apps from OrbStack via Unix sockets.

| Feature | Description | |---|---| 🍎 Native macOS | Metal/OpenGL rendering, seamless desktop integration | 🚀 Zero VM Overhead | Direct Wayland protocol via socket, no virtualization | 📺 HiDPI Ready | Optimized for Retina displays with proper scaling | 🎨 Polished UI | Server-side decorations with shadows and focus indicators | ⚡ Hardware Accelerated | Efficient OpenGL rendering pipeline |

brew tap J-x-Z/tap
brew install cocoa-way waypipe-darwin

Download the latest .dmg

or .zip

from Releases.

# Install dependencies
brew install libxkbcommon pixman pkg-config
# Clone and build
git clone https://github.com/J-x-Z/cocoa-way.git
cd cocoa-way
cargo build --release

⚠️ Required:You must install waypipe-darwin to connect Linux apps.brew tap J-x-Z/tap && brew install waypipe-darwin

**Start the compositor:**cocoa-way

Connect Linux apps via SSH:./run_waypipe.sh ssh user@linux-host firefox

graph LR
subgraph macOS
CW[Cocoa-Way<br/>Compositor]
WP1[waypipe<br/>client]
end
subgraph Linux VM/Container
WP2[waypipe<br/>server]
APP[Linux App<br/>Firefox, etc]
end
APP -->|Wayland Protocol| WP2
WP2 <-->|SSH/Socket| WP1
WP1 -->|Wayland Protocol| CW
CW -->|Metal/OpenGL| Display[macOS Display]

| Solution | Latency | HiDPI | Native Integration | Setup Complexity | |---|---|---|---|---| Cocoa-Way | ⚡ Low | ✅ | ✅ Native windows | 🟢 Easy | | XQuartz | 🐢 High | 🟡 Medium | || | VNC | 🐢 High | ❌ | ❌ Full screen | 🟡 Medium | | VM GUI | 🐢 High | ❌ Separate window | 🔴 Complex |

macOS backend (Metal/OpenGL)
Waypipe integration
HiDPI scaling
🚧 Windows backend (win-way)
📱 Android NDK backend (planned)
Multi-monitor support
Clipboard sync

This project is part of the "Turbo-Charged Protocol Virtualization" research initiative exploring zero-cost cross-platform Wayland via Rust trait monomorphization + SIMD-accelerated pixel conversion.

SSH: "remote port forwarding failed"

A stale socket file exists on the remote host. Our run_waypipe.sh

script handles this automatically with -o StreamLocalBindUnlink=yes

If running manually:

waypipe ssh -o StreamLocalBindUnlink=yes user@host ...

Contributions welcome! Please open an issue first to discuss major changes.

Source: Hacker News