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Quick question:

I have so many things configured in my Ubuntu 16.10 machine. IDEs, emacs,configuration files, zh, keybindings, touchpad configuration, etc etc etc.

I want to try Gnome 3, but I don't want to install a new OS (Ubuntu Gnome), is there anyway to just install gnome de, in a stable way?

Or, a way to pack and unpack all my OS configuration and programs into a new distribution? (If I really had to change from Ubuntu to Ubuntu Gnome?)

Alo
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3 Answers3

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Yes go to the command line and type sudo apt install gnome this will install the gnome GUI at some point you will be given a choice of display manager either lightDM or GDM personally I would recommend lightDM once the install is complete logout and choose which desktop to use.

Edit 1 If you just want the gnome shell with none of the 'bundled' packages then type sudo apt install gnome-shell

LinuxSailorTech
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  • Awesome! Is there anything that may break? How was your experience? – Alo Jan 13 '17 at 15:52
  • Hi @Alo so far I have not discovered anything that has broken however it did take a little while (about 2-3 hours) to get used to finding my way around the gnome interface but after that it was easy – LinuxSailorTech Jan 16 '17 at 10:13
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If you want to be super sure that nothing is going to mess up, then don't install anything and use a LiveCD instead. This allows you to try any Ubuntu flavour from a CD/USB.

To try this option, create a LIVECD, just as if you were to install Ubuntu. But then, when booting, select "Try Ubuntu without installing", as below:

enter image description here

Naturally, you need to create a LiveCD with Ubuntu Gnome. You can get it here. Official instructions to create ISO are here.

-1

You could install the Gnome 3.20 Desktop environment on your Ubuntu 16.10 OS. After installing that, you could switch desktop environments before logging in.

For installing Gnome 3.20 DE, open up your terminal and type these commands.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3-staging
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3
sudo apt update
sudo apt dist-upgrade
sudo apt install gnome gnome-shell

Read this for more reference.

Levi
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    Please do not attempt this if you use unity desktop, as this will surely break it. Since this is a repository with constant updates there is also a chance of breaking gnome shell session. – xangua Jan 13 '17 at 17:34
  • I don't think there's a good reason to suggest the installation of pre-release version from a third-party package repository to a novice user if there's a perfectly fine stable package of the same software in Canonical's maintained repositories. -1 (see the linked question for more info) – David Foerster Jan 19 '17 at 00:37
  • It hadn't breaked my system anyway. Thats why I suggested it to him. Anyway he could wait for a stable release or try older stable versions. – Levi Jan 21 '17 at 14:26