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First, a piece of advice: in Xubuntu 18.04, there is a pre-installed application called Web Browser. It is NOT a Web Browser. I uninstalled it via Software Center thinking it was redundant with Firefox around, but it deleted a bunch of things, among them exo something (no idea what those are but they look important), File Manager, Terminal and who knows what else.

This is exactly what happened to me:

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1216218

When I looked to my installed apps in GNOME Software, I saw a "Web browser" with very little info, so I removed it. GNOME Software issued no warning and I removed exo and half of Xfce (I was running on Xfce). After restart, everything stopped working (no xfdesktop, na panel, etc...).

I consider this dangerous.

Now, desktop is gone, with Super key + R I get the list of installed apps, most of them are still there and launching. Opened Software Center, but when I try to re-install Web Browser, Terminal or File Manager, I have an error mentioning unset dependencies.

My question is: how can I get back what I deleted with no Terminal? Of course no back-up, it is my father's PC, I am managing it for him (and not doing a very good job it seems).

Much appreciated. And for the love of God, DO NOT delete that ill-named Web Browser app.

UPDATE FROM 18/12/2018

Guys, thank you but no luck. I managed to get to a terminal with Crtl + Alt + Fwhatever but I have the following screen:

enter image description here

Macol is the username used during installation, I tried with the password but I keep on getting Login incorrect. I do not even know what I should type after Macol login, the username is already there. The password is the right one (4 numbers), the keyboard has the right layout, I tried to type it in the previous field (the PC has no numpad, I used the row under F keys) and no problems. I also tried CAPS on/off for the username. sudo of course is not working.

My options now are:

  1. Login with your help and try your previous suggestions
  2. Format everything by installing Xubuntu 18.10 and call it a day
Travis
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    can you get to a command line with ctrl+alt+F3 ? – Joshua Besneatte Nov 27 '18 at 22:29
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    Can you access a terminal interface? (ctrl+alt+f4 or whatever fn key you prefer) When it deletes If it was me, I'd look at your logs, and just re-install what you removed; or at worst you could sudo apt install xubuntu-desktop – guiverc Nov 27 '18 at 22:30
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    The Web Browser shortcut you see opens what the default web browser is set to. You can run a command from a terminal window like exo-open www.google.com that will launch your default web browser to Google. From the exo-open man page: exo-open - Open URLs and launch preferred applications When in doubt, try looking in the man pages for what applications are used for. – Terrance Nov 27 '18 at 22:36
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    See https://askubuntu.com/a/50624/231142 for the possibility of recovering accidentally removed apps from a terminal window like using Ctrl+Alt+f3 – Terrance Nov 27 '18 at 22:38
  • Thank you guys, I di not have daily access to my dad's PC, I will try all of the above when there and report back. I feel such an idiot, like I had deleted System32 back in the Windows days. – Travis Nov 28 '18 at 09:15
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    “I do not even know what I should type after Macol login, the username is already there.” Not really. Your hostname is there. The username might be the same (or the same in lowercase). See also https://askubuntu.com/questions/444289/how-to-log-in-using-the-tty. – Melebius Dec 19 '18 at 15:52
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    Possible duplicate of How do I switch between GUI and command line startup? – karel Jan 18 '19 at 08:00
  • Possible duplicate of Installing Xubuntu 14.04 desktop over ubuntu 14.04 desktop – karel Jan 18 '19 at 08:06

2 Answers2

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You should be able to drop to a command shell with Ctrl+Alt+F3.

From there you can log in and run some fixit commands:

sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade --fix-missing

Then you can try to install/reinstall xubuntu-core/desktop

sudo apt install --reinstall xubuntu-core xubuntu-desktop
slava
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Joshua Besneatte
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    Thank you, will try that as soon as I am at my dad's. Will report back and mark it as resolved if so. – Travis Nov 28 '18 at 09:16
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Thank you for your help guys, but I ended up re-installing everything, Xubuntu 18.10 this time.

Travis
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