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I like the Unity layout a lot more and was wondering if I could change without deleting everything.

wjandrea
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Orion
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  • You mean you dont want to just log out and log in in Unity but you also want to delete the Gnome related packages that are not used in Unity? – M. Becerra Nov 14 '16 at 18:51
  • you can always switch. also you use the software-installation tag here. –  Nov 14 '16 at 18:54
  • Don't see why not. Obviously, you'll need to install ubuntu-desktop first. – mikewhatever Nov 14 '16 at 19:29
  • All you need to do is sudo apt install ubuntu-desktop and change it on the log in screen BUT I highly recommend a clean install, systems with multiple desktop environments, tend to have a few "quirks" when switching and removing Gnome will be an absolute nightmare. – Mark Kirby Nov 14 '16 at 19:53

2 Answers2

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I would recommend doing a full reinstall, because as @MarkKirby stated, systems have some "quirks" with two environments.

You can probably back up your personal files, but you can check this question and it's answers for how to save your apps.

Community
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You can switch desktop environments at will by installing the proper packages, but this can cause problems, as differing desktop environments tend to conflict with each other in very strange ways. This is especially more apparent when going back to the "old" environment, as the new environment has likely overwritten important settings.

Meaning, Unity should likely work normally in your case, but GNOME will likely not be the same and may not work anymore. If this is no problem to you, then there's no issue here. Note that this doesn't mean that your Unity installation will be flawless, either. It is honestly better to just re-install Ubuntu Desktop.

With this warning in mind, you can still install Unity and Ubuntu desktop using the following command:

sudo apt install ubuntu-desktop
Kaz Wolfe
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