Ceci est une ancienne révision du document !
NOTE: Don’t kernel panic, programmers, Greg will be back with more Python next month. Before beginning, please understand that I'm no genius, far from it. My focus has been on Classic (with no effects) only because I've never cared for Compiz anyway, and, from what I've read, it seems to be difficult to get it to run in a classic Oneiric DE. So, if you want Compiz this is NOT for you, sorry. However I do hope someone else will be able to expand on this. I've tested this quite a bit, but only with fresh, fully updated Ubuntu Oneiric installs. Your mileage may vary with installations that have other underlying problems.
NOTE : Pas de noyau paniqué, les programmeurs, Greg sera de retour avec Python le mois prochain.
Avant de commencer, je vous prie de comprendre que je ne suis pas un génie, loin de là. Je ne me suis concentré sur Classic (sans effets) que parce que je n'ai jamais aimé Compiz de toute façon et, d'après ce que j'ai lu, il y auraient des difficultés pour le faire fonctionner dans un environnement de bureau classique Oneiric. Ainsi, si vous voulez Compiz, cet article n'est PAS pour vous. Navré. Toutefois, j'espère vraiment que quelqu'un d'autre saura le développer.
J'ai fait pas mal de tests, mais uniquement avec des installations d'Ubuntu Oneiric neuves et entièrement mises à jour. Des installations avec d'autres problèmes sous-jacents, peuvent donner des résultats différents.
Important warning: Many of the changes made here can and will break Unity, so I highly recommend first testing this either in a virtual machine or a multi-boot. I personally prefer an actual multi-boot but that's just a matter of choice. Another safe way to try this would be to create a new user account with administrative rights, that way the configuration files you change will affect only that new account. Then, if you decide to apply the changes to your original user account, the needed PPA's and packages will already be installed, so you'll need to complete only those steps needed to obtain the desired configuration. And then the new user account could be deleted. This guide is almost totally reliant on copy and pasting commands into gnome-terminal. Why? Quite simply, not all of this can be completed using GUI tools like Ubuntu Tweak or 'gnome-tweak-tool', and installing 'gnome-tweak-tool' results in installing a large number of unneeded packages including 'gnome-shell', and my only concern is getting a “classic w/o effects” desktop environment (DE) running efficiently. Should someone care to use either Ubuntu Tweak or 'gnome-tweak-tool', I have no problem with that, I just prefer the CLI. Also, if I didn't include “sudo” in the command, then it's not needed, and in rare instances may result in changed permissions, so please just copy and paste! Note: If a “step” can be performed using Ubuntu Tweak and/or 'gnome-tweak-tool', I will mention it briefly at the end of that individual step.
First, take a look below at what I ended up with, and then I'll explain how I got there.
You'll notice that I prefer only one panel at the bottom. I realize some may want two panels, or one at the top only, it's purely a matter of preference.
You also need to know that you must now hold down either Alt key while right-clicking on a panel or applet to be able to edit panel preferences or to add/edit/move/remove more applets. That was an intentional move by the Gnome devs to prevent people from unintentionally breaking things. And you also can't just add application applets by right-clicking them and selecting “add to panel” anymore. You must now open the “add-to-panel” window and select Application Launcher > Forward, then the window changes and you can click on the “bullet” to the left of each category to display and add any app in the menu to the panel:
But let’s also look at Panel Properties settings. Note here that in Panel Properties > Background I've found that 'Solid color' > Color > Color name #3F3E39 / Style > Opaque results in vastly improved appearance of the Workspace Switcher, a picture's worth a thousand words:
To be perfectly honest, I now forget I'm even using Gnome 3 most of the time other than learning the new keyboard shortcuts which still confuse me. I do know that Ctrl + Alt + T launches gnome-terminal, but even it can be fiddly. I suspect that the new keybindings are truly designed for Gnome Shell, not the “fallback” DE, which I expect to see disappear altogether eventually (hopefully not before the release of Precise Pangolin, though).
Now it's time to move on to how I got there, one step at a time.
Step #1
We simply need to install 'gnome-session-fallback' - which is already in the Ubuntu repos:
sudo apt-get install gnome-session-fallback
Step #2
You'd quickly find that 'indicator-applet', 'indicator-applet-complete', and 'indicator-applet-session' are lacking in “Add to panel”. You'll really need either 'indicator-applet' or 'indicator-applet-complete' to display some of the notifications such as mail, the hardware sensors and/or system monitor indicators, and the update-notifier. (I personally only use 'indicator-applet', but we all have individual preferences). So we need to install Jason Conti's PPA (https://launchpad.net/~jconti/+archive/gnome3), and our first additional packages:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:jconti/gnome3
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install indicator-applet indicator-applet-complete indicator-applet-session
When that is complete, it's time to take your first look at the new “classic” DE by simply logging out, then clicking on the “gear” to the right of your user name on the login screen, selecting Classic (No effects), entering your password, and logging back in. You'll hopefully see this:
Now, before continuing, please understand that all of these additional steps are optional. No two people want the exact same look, feel, or function out of a DE! This is just what I wanted. Pick and choose to suit your own desires.
Step #3
I quickly realized that the purple background of the terminal was killing my eyes, so, in terminal, I clicked Edit > Profile Preferences > Colors, and unticked the “Use colors from system theme” box. Then, in the same window, I clicked on the color block next to “Background color”, and used the eyedropper to set the background to white. Ahhhh, much easier on the eyes.
Step #4
I found the screen lock thing very annoying, I live alone and don't like having to enter my password every time the screen-“blanker” activates. So you can just go to System Tools > System Settings > Screen, and select Lock = Off. (I call it a screen-“blanker”, mostly as a joke, because it hardly resembles a screensaver any more).
Step #5
Even after setting Lock to Off, I found it annoying to have the screen-“blanker” activate while trying to watch videos or such. In Gnome 2, I used to be able to use 'gnome-inhibit-applet', but it's not available in Gnome 3. No worries, I found a very good replacement, Caffeine:
https://launchpad.net/~caffeine-developers/+archive/ppa
In my original screenshot, the caffeine applet shows up next to the indicator-applet. I find it to be a sweet replacement for the old 'gnome-inhibit-applet'. Once installed and set up, it allows you to “inhibit” the screen-“blanking”, I think a picture is worth a thousand words - so here:
Should you choose to install it you can set up Caffeine by going to Other > Caffeine preferences. Installation is easy:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:caffeine-developers/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install caffeine
Note: This works equally well in Unity.
Step #6
In Unity, the update-notifications now show up in the Launcher, but, without the Launcher, we now get no persistent update notifications. Still, no worries, I got it to show up in either 'indicator-applet' or 'indicator-applet-complete' in gnome-panel by running the command:
gsettings set com.ubuntu.update-notifier auto-launch false
You can revert that by running:
gsettings set com.ubuntu.update-notifier auto-launch true
Step #7
I really liked using either 'gnome-sensors-applet' or 'computertemp' to display system temps in the panel, but again they're not available with Gnome 3. Again no worries, Hardware Sensors Indicator comes to the rescue:
https://launchpad.net/~alexmurray/+archive/indicator-sensors
More about that here: http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=11492701&postcount=4.
To install, just run these three commands:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:alexmurray/indicator-sensors
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install indicator-sensors
It then shows up in System Tools > Hardware Sensors Indicator. After launching it the first time, you must click on the new “applet” which just says “No active sensors”, and click on Preferences. From there you can select which sensors to display, and other options.
Step #8
It's also sometimes nice to display CPU and memory usage in the panel, so here's System Monitor Indicator: https://launchpad.net/indicator-sysmonitor
More about it here: http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=11473552&postcount=208.
To install just run these three commands:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:alexeftimie/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install indicator-sysmonitor
It then shows up in Accessories > System monitor indicator. Do not confuse it with System Monitor in System Tools. I think setting it up is almost self explanatory.
Step #9
I found the overlay-scrollbars to be inconsistent and annoying in the classic DE, so I removed them, but that was totally a matter of preference, and this is one of those steps that really seems to somewhat break Unity! Should you want to remove them, run:
sudo apt-get purge liboverlay-scrollbar-0.2-0 liboverlay-scrollbar3-0.2-0 overlay-scrollbar
Note: You'll likely have to reboot for that change to fully take effect.
Step #10
At this point I decided the window-management buttons really needed to be back on the right so I ran:
gconftool-2 –set “/apps/metacity/general/button_layout” –type string “:minimize,maximize,close”
Note: to restore the defaults run:
gconftool-2 –set “/apps/metacity/general/button_layout” –type string “close,minimize,maximize:”
Note: This step (#10) can also be performed using Ubuntu Tweak.
Step #11
At this point, I'm fairly happy, but the scrollbar color is hard on my eyes. It's like trying to differentiate between two shades of white. I'd really prefer having the scrollbars match the dark gray panel or window title-bar with a white background, but I haven't been able to figure that out yet. The best alternative I've found so far is changing the metacity and gtk themes this way:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webupd8team/themes
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install shiki-colors-metacity-theme zukitwo-dark-gtk-theme
gconftool-2 -s –type string /apps/metacity/general/theme Shiki-Colors-Metacity
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface gtk-theme Zukitwo-Dark
I found that fairly pleasing to my eyes (it also replaced the drastic orange with a nice grayish-blue, and I like the “retro” look of the window management buttons), but if you should decide to revert to the default Ambiance themes just run:
gconftool-2 -s –type string /apps/metacity/general/theme Ambiance
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface gtk-theme Ambiance
Note: Both Ubuntu Tweak and 'gnome-tweak-tool' can be used for applying themes, but NOT installing themes.
I'm very open to suggestions about theming - this is simply the best combo I've come up with so far.
Step #12
I also dislike the missing menu and button icons, so I run:
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface menus-have-icons true
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface buttons-have-icons true
Note: This step (#12) can also be performed using Ubuntu Tweak.
Step #13
This one is the hardest for me to explain. By default the Oneiric desktop is set to NOT display any icons, but it's possible for the desktop to display any combination of these icons/“actors”:
Computer (computer-icon-visible)
Home (home-icon-visible)
Network (network-icon-visible)
Trash (trash-icon-visible)
Mounted volumes (volumes-visible)
But, to do so, you must first set the “stage” by running:
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.background show-desktop-icons true
But that only sets the stage for the actors, now you must decide which actors you want on the stage. You're now the director.
After running that command, either reboot, or log out and log back in. When you get back to a blank DE background, decide what you want displayed. (Hint, the “true” or “false” at the end of these commands is the key):
To show the Computer icon run: gsettings set org.gnome.nautilus.desktop computer-icon-visible true
To hide the Computer icon run: gsettings set org.gnome.nautilus.desktop computer-icon-visible false
To show the Home icon run: gsettings set org.gnome.nautilus.desktop home-icon-visible true
To hide the Home icon run: gsettings set org.gnome.nautilus.desktop home-icon-visible false
To show the Network icon run: gsettings set org.gnome.nautilus.desktop network-icon-visible true
To hide the Network icon run: gsettings set org.gnome.nautilus.desktop network-icon-visible false
To show the Trash icon run: gsettings set org.gnome.nautilus.desktop trash-icon-visible true
To hide the Trash icon run: gsettings set org.gnome.nautilus.desktop trash-icon-visible false
To show Mounted Volumes run: gsettings set org.gnome.nautilus.desktop volumes-visible true
To hide Mounted Volumes run: gsettings set org.gnome.nautilus.desktop volumes-visible false
Note: This step can also be performed using either Ubuntu Tweak or 'gnome-tweak-tool'.
Step #14
You may or may not find that you need to disable the Firefox and/or Thunderbird global menu add-ons. It seems to depend on the panel configuration, but I'm not quite sure. To do so in Firefox, just go to Tools > Add-ons > Global Menu Bar integration, and select Disable. You'll then be prompted to restart Firefox. I don't use Thunderbird, so I can't be sure of the specific procedure with it, but I'd think it's similar.
That's it! I hope others will share their favorite Oneiric classic tips and tricks. Maybe someone can even share how they got classic to run with Compiz since that's not my thing.