[meta] Recommend `wtype` over `ydotool`

[danielgafni]

ydotool type has ben quite problematic for me:

• it doesn't work with non-ASCII characters, including any languages other than English. Apparently this has been raised for years in the ydotool repo.
• it requires additional user permissions to use the virtual device
• it needs a daemon and communicates over a socket that has to be configured as well
• it requires extra configuration to produce output immediately (there is a delay between producing characters by default)

On the other hand, wtype works with any Unicode characters and doesn't require any additional setup, it's using virtual-keyboard-v1 Wayland protocol directly.

[juddey]

I tried to use wtype with another repo today (voxtype.io) and found that it didnt work well in vscode, apparently wtype's use in electron apps is a known issue.

[danielgafni]

I see, to be fair I'm not using VS Code and haven't tried it with Electron apps

[juddey]

Fair, and for everything else, wtype worked as advertised. Good to have both options for differing use cases.

[tomjo]

Just wanted to mention I've been using waystt with dotool instead of ydotool since it had issues with non-qwerty keyboard layouts, this might also be an option for people.

[DaWe35]

I came here because wtype is not working for me (KDE Plasma, Arch)

> wtype "test text"
Compositor does not support the virtual keyboard protocol

I just wish waystt would work in real time models