Ubuntu Classic (Gnome)

I know my friend Brad isn’t the only person who wants to know this and I’ve seen several confusing and excessive responses to this question, so I’m going to make it plain and simple for you all! And you get multiple options! Woohoo!

Quick Explanation

Ubuntu 11.04 ships with the new Unity interface as the default GUI, but it also comes with other options like “Ubuntu Classic” and “Ubuntu Classic (no effects)”. You can select which one you use from the login screen and/or set a different option as your default. See below for more.

Option 1

Change at the Login Screen (may only be temporary)

One easy way is to simply choose “Ubuntu Classic” from the login screen*.

At the login screen, select the user you wish to login, type the password, but DO NOT press ENTER (or click Login) yet… Look at the bar on the bottom of the screen. See where it says “Unity”? Click that and change it to “Ubuntu Classic” (or use the “no effects” option if you have an older computer and/or video card).

Now you can login and you’re back to using Gnome (aka the “old” Ubuntu GUI). Depending on your system settings this may only be temporary. To ensure this is permanent see the next two sections.

Select Session at Login Screen

*Note: If you have auto-login enabled, you will have to logout first.

Option 2

Set Ubuntu Classic (Gnome) As Your Default GUI

Using the system settings (don’t be scared, it’s not as bad as it sounds) you can set Ubuntu Classic (or it’s “no effects” clone) as your default GUI. This is actually pretty easy.

Step 1: Click the system button located at the far top-right corner.
Step 2: Select “System Settings” (should be the last option) to open the Control Center

System Settings

Step 3: Select “System” on the left side, then “Login Screen” on the right, to open the Login Screen options window.

Ubuntu Control Center

Step 4: Click “Unlock” and enter your password (assuming you have sudo powers).

Login Screen Settings (Locked)

Step 5: Change the “Default Session” to “Ubuntu Classic” (or the vanilla “no effects”). Then close the window.

Login Screen Settings (Unlocked)

Step 6: Either log out and then back in, or restart your computer. Done.

Option 3

Set Ubuntu Classic (Gnome) As Your Default GUI — The (slightly) Faster Way

Step 1: Click the Ubuntu logo in the top-left corner. (This brings up the “Search” overhead/hub)
Step 2: Type: “Login” (no quotes) then click the “Login Screen” launcher.

Accessing Login Screen Settings from the Search Hub

Step 3: Click “Unlock” and enter your password (assuming you have sudo powers).

Login Screen Settings (Locked)

Step 4: Change the “Default Session” to “Ubuntu Classic” (or the vanilla “no effects”). Then close the window.

Login Screen Settings (Unlocked)

Step 5: Either log out and then back in, or restart your computer. Done.

Enjoy!

So my mom told me today that her Internet hasn’t been working since my sister was in town and disconnected her Ethernet cable and setup a wireless router and then put it all back to “normal”.

I’m not quite sure what caused the problem, but I went through the usual troubleshooting steps, including disconnecting the power from the cable modem, waiting 30-60 seconds, then powering it up to re-cycle it.

Once I booted up into Ubuntu 9.10 (yeah my mom is cool enough to run Linux) and tested out the connection. It appeared that network manager (nm) was somehow set to not manage networks by default anymore. So I did the following:


gksudo gedit /etc/NetworkManager/nm-system-settings.conf


Then I changed the settings to look like this:


[main]
plugins=ifupdown,keyfile

[ifupdown]
managed=true


(I changed managed from false to true… Then I restarted nm and tada! Worked just as good as before.

It still puzzles me how that got changed in the first place as my mom’s user account does not have admin permissions (I usually login remotely or stop by to visit to do any updates for her).