Laptop sat cold for a day, and after a cold boot up I discovered no internet connection, no wireless or network icon in top right icon tray.. no access via ethernet.. nothing!
Through terminal, despite trying all other obvious basics first, typed in nm-applet.. to be told the following:
** (process:3458): WARNING **: Could not initialize NMClient /org/freedesktop/networkManager:
The name org.freedesktop.NetworkManager was not provided by any .service files
NetworkManager Tool
State: Unknown
** (process:3458): WARNING **: error: could not connect to NetworkManager
nm-applet
** (nm-applet:3462): WARNING **: Could not initialize NMClient /org/freedesktop/networkManager:
The name org.freedesktop.NetworkManager was not provided by any .service files
(nm-applet:3462): nm-applet-WARNING **: Error connecting to ModemManager:
Error calling StartServiceByName for org.freedesktop.ModemManager1:
GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.Spawn.ExecFailed:
Cannot launch daemon, file not found or permissions invalid
(nm-applet:3462): nm-applet-WARNING **: Could not find ShellVersion property on org.gnome.Shell after 5 tries
(nm-applet:3462): nm-applet-WARNING **: Failed to register as an agent:
(2) The name org.freedesktop.NetworkManager was not provided by any .service files
(above entered verbatim - issue exists on another computer running Ubuntu 14.04 LTS - me: novice ubuntu user)