Platform Support 💻

[JosephTLyons]

Currently, Zed only supports macOS and Linux. Support for other platforms is planned and listed on our public roadmap.

Original placeholder issues tracking upvotes:

• Linux support #5395
• Windows support #5394
• FreeBSD support #15309
• Web support #5396

[aminya]

I tried to run Zed inside a Catalina VM because I don't use a Mac, however it failed. That's unfortunate, as I really wanted to test Zed.

First, I could not run it from the image file itself. After realizing that I needed to move it to the Application folder, I reran it multiple times, but it failed to run without showing any message.

Then, by running it from the terminal I could get an error message:

Error gpui::platform::mac::window] Unable to access a compatible graphics device

I installed the VM using Sosumi snap on Kubuntu 22.04.

This seems similar to
https://github.com/zed-industries/feedback/issues/272

[iamnbutler]

I tried to run Zed inside a Catalina VM because I don't use a Mac, however it failed. That's unfortunate, as I really wanted to test Zed.

First, I could not run it from the image file itself. After realizing that I needed to move it to the Application folder, I reran it multiple times, but it failed to run without showing any message.

Then, by running it from the terminal I could get an error message:

Error gpui::platform::mac::window] Unable to access a compatible graphics device

I installed the VM using Sosumi snap on Kubuntu 22.04.

This seems similar to #5571

Yeah unfortunately you won't be able to run Zed in a VM. We added that message as previously zed would try to open and immediately panic. I don't remember where, but someone tried this before and had an issue for it.

One of the other team members will need to speak to the technical side, but I think it has something to do with Metal.

[maxbrunsfeld]

Yeah, when running macOS on a VM, we don't have the GPU access that we currently depend on for rendering.

[iamnbutler]

Reposting my discord response about platform support here:

Hey y'all – We are excited that you all are excited to try Zed. Just want to make sure expectations are in check – We plan to release on multiple platforms for 1.0, but work on these has not even begun yet.

We're focusing on getting the editor into a good place on one platform first, then will direct attention to making it more widely available. We do have some team members hacking on experimental implementations on other platforms, but they are not official currently and have no expected date they will be testable.

We want to make sure that expectations are clear – We know y'all are dying to try Zed out on the platforms you love the most. I try to pop in when I can to make sure expectations are in check, but I've been a bit heads down recently.

From our faq (https://zed.dev/faq):

We're focusing on a single platform for now because we're a small team. At our current scale, maintaining additional platforms would represent a big cost without much additional learning. We plan to support Linux and Windows before 1.0, and to support a web version some time after that.

There is a tracking issue for platform support that you can follow along with here: https://github.com/zed-industries/feedback/issues/174 (this issue)

[heedfull]

FYI The windows issue is now locked, so I can't thumbs up to vote for it

[alerque]

I don't subscribe to the Windows issue but from the Linux one I would guess it probably got locked because people can't resist adding useless comments. That creates notification noise for hundreds of people subscribed to the issue hoping to be notified of real updates that probably don't want to hear about a hundred other people just hoping for the same thing they are waiting for.

Stop making useless comments just to +1 an issue. Subscribe if you want updates. If it's locked the developers probably don't care about the thumbs up count, nor do they need noise on other unrelated issues. Save the comments for things everybody needs to know — such as source code availability or more platform builds.

[patmaddox]

Please consider targeting FreeBSD as well. I haven't developed X11 apps on it myself, but there is a robust collection of X11 apps in the ports tree.

[alerque]

@patmaddox I don't know about on BSDs, but on Linux at least X11 is pretty much dead. Not so dead that it isn't still massively prevalent (I still use it on 2 out of 5 desktops around the house/office) but dead enough that it isn't being developed or even fixed these days. It is so long in the tooth distros are having to go to greater and greater lengths just to keep it working for legacy systems. At some point it will stop being viable altogether.

One would hope that a new project like this pushing the cutting edge of GUI tech would skip it and go straight to targeting Wayland. Unless they happen to use a toolkit that gets them support for X11 too at the same time, developing and testing on Wayland should be a priority and anything else secondary or tertiary. Personally (as a holdout myself) I would say just forget about it. All the cool toys are Wayland only these days and if you don't work out the media channels, screen capture, and input handling APIs there first you'll be playing catchup from day 1.

[patmaddox]

One would hope that a new project like this pushing the cutting edge of GUI tech would skip it and go straight to targeting Wayland.

I haven’t used it, but FreeBSD supports Wayland. There’s a lot of user discussion about Wayland, so I guess support is pretty good and there will be continued investment in it.

It looks like the ports are keeping up with Wayland releases:

• https://www.freshports.org/graphics/wayland/
• https://www.freshports.org/graphics/wayland-protocols

[mlevkov]

Is there a reason why Zed is only supporting 10.15+ and not versions prior? I'm on 10.14 and cannot update to 10.15. However, I would be interested in trying Zed.

[JosephTLyons]

Is there a reason why Zed is only supporting 10.15+ and not versions prior? I'm on 10.14 and cannot update to 10.15. However, I would be interested in trying Zed.

A feature we added required a library that made us bump our OS minimum version requirement

[mlevkov]

Making it an optional plug-in would allow users who do not need such a feature to consider using your IDE. I, for example, care less about sharing code with others in either pair programming sessions or otherwise. However, I'd be delighted to use the editor for my needs, but I will not change the os and the setup to use the editor. Thus, a delayed consideration may occur here once the OS change occurs.

[ZZzzaaKK]

Currently, Zed only supports macOS. Support for other platforms is planned, but it is not being prioritized in the short term.

Feel free to add +1s and discuss anything you might want in the following issues:

• https://github.com/zed-industries/feedback/issues/172
• https://github.com/zed-industries/feedback/issues/171
• https://github.com/zed-industries/feedback/issues/173

Updates to development in cross-compatibility will be posted to these individual issues, whenever work in that area begins.

Note: We are currently not tracking platform support issues in the Top-Ranking Issues, in order to keep the list geared more towards short-term items.

The links to the platform-specific issues appear to be broken. Could you replace feedback with community in each link to make them valid again like so:
#5395
#5394
#5396

[hovsater]

@ZZzzaaKK thanks for the heads up. I've updated the links. 🙂

[JosephTLyons]

Our for those following this issue, our roadmap is now public.

[JosephTLyons]

A tracking issue for Linux has been written up here:

• Linux Roadmap #7015