Ubuntu 11.10 - Unity, grrrr...

fwor

Am I just being dense? Just done a dist-upgrade from 11.04 to 11.10 and discovered that, although you can dodge the new Unity desktop in 11.04, you can't this time, as the "classic" desktop is no longer a login option.

That would probably be Ok, except that I can't figure out how to turn it off! Prior to the upgrade, there was the classic on/off button at the right hand end of the top panel bar. Now the rightmost item is the username, so I have to select that, then "switch user", and then on the next login screen there is an on/off button. Surely there's an easier way?

With the previous Gnome desktop (or any of the others AFAIK) I would have been able to fix the problem by just right-clicking the top panel bar and adding an on/off icon from there. But in Unity, right-clicking on the bar does nothing.

Is this just a dist-upgrade gone wrong, with an easy way round? Or is it best to give up on Unity (and hence give up on the main Ubuntu releases which appear fully committed to it and the dropping of Gnome)?

Hammyman

I've not played with it but apparently you still can, no doubt by editing some config file or other. I'd have a look on the Ubuntuforums.org - you're apparently not the only one who dislikes unity.

fwor

Hammyman wrote: »

no doubt by editing some config file or other.

It's not quite that bad - no config file editing ~should~ be needed. If you can live with LXDE as a desktop, it's just a click away on the "cogs" icon where you enter the username. It's just annoying that, while Gnome/Openbox is also an option when you login, if you select it you just get Unity!

Perhaps I should just try a clean re-install rather than a dist-upgrade. At a guess I'd say that in the past, around 90% of dist-upgrades I've done have gone Ok, and the rest were a mess....

I should add that I'm not complaining as such. It's a free OS, so I can't really ask for my money back.

fermi

You certainly can still have a classic Gnome session.

I have, and it works just fine. (see the pic)

Not quite sure how I ended up with that?

I use KDE most of the time.

Esqui

You can install gnome-shell from the software centre, which has Gnome classic as well.

fermi

Ok. Just looked in synaptic and that shows me that the "Gnome Classic" session comes from installing the gnome-session-fallback package.

So presumably

sudo apt-get install gnome-session-fallback

will do it?

May need to add gnome-shell as well?

(or install via synaptic)

fermi

I should add that xfce (xubuntu) seems to be a very good alternative to the old classic gnome2 desktop.

May be worth installing and trying as well.

tweeter

I gave up on any that have the Unity aspect about them, and I've returned to Maverick Meerkat 10.10 because, when using Natty Narwhal 11.04 with a Classic front end, it would open my Evolution emailer in only one work space at a time, unlike Maverick Meerkat 10.10 which will open Evolution emailer in multiple workspaces using different aspects of this email programme simultaneously, which helps me because of eyesight problems.

ps. does anyone know how to tweak the multiple workspaces so I can get different emailer aspects working in different workspaces in 11.04 - have tried asking on Ubuntu forums with no success.

fwor

fermi wrote: »

You certainly can still have a classic Gnome session.

I have, and it works just fine. (see the pic)

Your pic shows pretty much what I had after my clean install of 11.04 a few months ago, so it's frustrating that the dist-upgrade of that to 11.10 no longer (by default) gives me the desktop that I was actually using before the upgrade!

As you say, installing gnome-session-fallback adds back the login options for Gnome Classic and (no effects), but the menus in Gnome have been screwed up, so no on/off button, and no System menu. Right-clicking on the top bar still does nothing. Guess I'll have to do a clean install, which I don't really mind too much.

Reading between the lines, it looks like there is a power struggle going on between the Gnome developers and Canonical, but I don't know where that will end. Perhaps with the Gnome desktop code being removed from the *ubuntu repositories?

fwor

tweeter wrote: »

ps. does anyone know how to tweak the multiple workspaces so I can get different emailer aspects working in different workspaces in 11.04 - have tried asking on Ubuntu forums with no success.

Do you mean that you are trying to run multiple instances of Evolution in different workspaces? I don't use Evolution now, but I suspect that you can't do it now because of changes in Evolution itself, not the Linux kernel.

The kernel shouldn't care, but applications often have problems with multiple copies of themselves running simultaneously - typically with record locking, where it's too easy for two instances to get into a "deadly embrace" and lock the application up. Hence most applications now seem to check on startup to see if another instance is already running, and won't start a second one if there is.

The trend now seems to be towards multiple tabs within an app. If Evolution supports tabs, would that help? Thunderbird for example lets you zoom in on text in message reading tabs, while the Inbox tab remains using the system default font size.

tweeter

fwor, yes, I can run multiple instances of Evolution email programme in 10.10 in different workspaces and open different/multiple aspects of it: emails/contacts/calendar/memos/tasks etc in different workspaces at the same time, but not in 11.10.

ps, I've also noticed that in 11.10 you can only open a browser in one workspace no matter how many workspaces you have, whereas in 10.10 you can open the same browser in as many workspaces as you like. I know you can open tabs, but having many browsers open at the same time and on different web pages as well as tabs, helps me because of eyesight problems.