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# Showing Wayland Compositor Fullscreen in Portrait Orientation
- URL: https://www.smallstepsystems.com/showing-wayland-compositor-fullscreen-in-portrait-orientation/
- Published: 2021-02-13T13:39:24.000Z
- Updated: 2026-01-25T12:23:27.000Z
- Author: Burkhard Stubert
- Tags: Applications & Services, Embedded Linux

Our Qt embedded system is displayed on a monitor mounted in portrait orientation. The system runs the Wayland compositor Weston as a window manager. HMI applications are shown rotated by 90 degrees - in landscape orientation. The system toolbar of Weston is visible. How can we configure Weston so that the applications are shown in portrait orientation and so that the system toolbar is removed?

In 2018, I had to solve this problem for the secondary terminal of the ROPA Tiger 6S sugar-beet harvester: the left terminal [in this photo](https://www.ropa-maschinenbau.de/site/assets/files/22216/ropa%5Ftiger%5F6s%5Fcabin.jpg?ref=smallstepsystems.com). The system runs [on a terminal from Christ Electronics](https://www.christ-es.com/index.php?id=623&Automotive&ref=smallstepsystems.com) with a quad-core i.MX6\. It uses [eglfs](https://doc.qt.io/qt-5/embedded-linux.html?ref=smallstepsystems.com) as a trivial window manager. Eglfs allows a single application to render its contents on a single window. Eglfs doesn't support rotating the screen on the i.MX6.

We developed the application in landscape orientation. While developing the application, we had to tilt our heads to the right to see the application in portrait orientation. When mounting the terminal, we rotated it 90 degrees counter-clockwise so that the users could see the application in portrait orientation. The QML code rotated the application 90 degrees clockwise. The solution was quite literally pain in the neck.

![Writing the software in landscape orientation and rotating the monitor to show it in portrait orientation](https://storage.ghost.io/c/c7/ee/c7ee1cf5-b86f-491b-aab7-20ad081598e1/content/images/2025/11/weston-1.png)

In 2021, I had to solve the same problem for another product. As I am not allowed to talk about this product, I'll stick to my faithful harvester application. My system runs on a [Toradex Verdin i.MX8M Mini](https://www.toradex.com/de/computer-on-modules/verdin-arm-family/nxp-imx-8m-mini-nano?ref=smallstepsystems.com#features) computer-on-module. I built the Linux image *tdx-reference-multimedia-image* and its SDK for Yocto 3.1 Dunfell. The image contains Weston (the default Wayland compositor) and Qt 5.14.

By default, Weston expects the monitor in landscape orientation. Hence, the result from running the harvester application doesn't come as a surprise.

![Portrait application shown on landscape monitor with default Weston configuration](https://storage.ghost.io/c/c7/ee/c7ee1cf5-b86f-491b-aab7-20ad081598e1/content/images/2025/11/weston-portrait-1.png)

Weston shows the application rotated by 90 degrees counter-clockwise and shows the system toolbar with the terminal application, date and time. We need to modify the Weston configuration file `/etc/xdg/weston/weston.ini` on the Verdin system.

We add the following output section to `weston.ini` and remove or comment out already existing output sections.

```
[output]
name=HDMI-A-1
mode=1280x800@59.0
transform=90
```

We find the `name` and `mode` in the system log file `/var/log/weston.log`.

```
[18:16:42.897] Output HDMI-A-1 (crtc 33) video modes:
               1280x800@59.0, preferred, current, 70.0 MHz
               1280x800@59.8, 83.5 MHz
```

The *Output Section* of the [weston.ini documentation](https://www.carta.tech/man-pages/man5/weston.ini.5.html?ref=smallstepsystems.com) shows us how to rotate the screen. The line `transform=90` rotates the screen 90 degrees clockwise. We could also show the screen upside down (180 degrees rotation), flip the screen horizontally and apply some other transformations.

After rebooting the Verdin system, Weston shows the application in portrait orientation.

![Weston shows the application in portrait mode with the system toolbar at the top.](https://storage.ghost.io/c/c7/ee/c7ee1cf5-b86f-491b-aab7-20ad081598e1/content/images/2025/11/weston-portrait-2.png)

Weston still shows the system toolbar at the top. We remove the toolbar by setting the panel position to `none` in the `shell` section of the `weston.ini` file.

```
[shell]
panel-position=none
```

The other value `top` is the default panel position, as revealed by the *Shell Section* of the [weston.ini documentation](https://www.carta.tech/man-pages/man5/weston.ini.5.html?ref=smallstepsystems.com). After rebooting the Verdin system, Weston shows the application in portrait orientation without the system toolbar.

![Weston shows the application in portrait orientation without the system toolbar at the top.](https://storage.ghost.io/c/c7/ee/c7ee1cf5-b86f-491b-aab7-20ad081598e1/content/images/2025/11/weston-portrait-3.png)