Uninstalling the Unity Desktop

[Philip Gray]

Good evening

Last month I read in the LinuxUser magazine (issue 112 page 43) I purchase every month on how to remove the Unity Desktop from 12.04. I do not like the Unity Desktop I think it is the worst desktop I have seen in a long time. It is not user friendly. Basically it was designed for idiots.

I want to remove it because, firstly I have no intention of ever using it, and secondly it is occupying space I can use for more useful programs.

My question is: if I remove it will it break my system and make it unusable. I am currently using GNOME Classic and I am intending to install the Cinnamon Desktop to see which one gives me the best GNOME 2 environment.

The command was:
sudo apt-get remove unity unity-2d
Followed by:
sudo apt-get autoremove
to remove all the dependcy packages.

Regards Philip

[Version Dependency]

Even though you called me an idiot, I figured I should help you out: http://askubuntu.com/questions/6302/how-can-you-remove-unity
):P

[vasa1]

Good evening

... Basically it was designed for idiots.

...
Regards Philip
Throw the rule book at 'im.

[3Miro]

Contrary to popular belief, Unity is only a small part of the system, Unity sits on top of Gnome and you will be using Gnome anyway. If you remove Unity, all you will save is a few megabytes off your HDD, remember that nothing from Unity ever gets loaded into RAM unless you use it.

If you want to use Gnome Classic, just use classic and just don't use Unity. I am not sure what dependencies it may break, but it is really not worth the trouble.

[markbl]

If you remove Unity, all you will save is a few megabytes off your HDD, remember that nothing from Unity ever gets loaded into RAM unless you use it.
I absolutely concur with this. I don't understand these occassional threads where people want to remove Unity from their system? Unity is part of Ubuntu and you are morely likely to break something by removing it. Just don't log in to it!

[kansasnoob]

I absolutely concur with this. I don't understand these occassional threads where people want to remove Unity from their system? Unity is part of Ubuntu and you are morely likely to break something by removing it. Just don't log in to it!

Me three:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=12104663&postcount=107

[Philip Gray]

Hi Version Dependency

My comment was not intended to call you an idiot. It is a common term used in the IT industry to refer to users that have absolutely no idea how to use and operate a computer. Seen that you took offense I apologize to you for my comment. I still feel that Unity is primarily aimed at those users. I have been using computers since the Commodore 64 days and moved to MSDos 3.1 I find Unity to be cumbersome, inefficient and long winded. This is just my view point.

Hi other commentators
While I appreciate some people may think removing unity is a trivial exercise it is not to me. I do not see why I should keep it. If it is integral to Ubuntu then that is a pity because one can then draw a parallel To Microsoft and Internet Explorer and their EU Commission Court Case where they were ordered to remove IE from Windows. Microsoft's defense was they could not because it was integrated into Windows. After which they proceeded to integrate it even more. This is one of the reasons I moved to Linux:- the lack of choice and having things forced on me.

Besides saving space the other reason is that in the login screen it is at the top of the desktop options. I have added a login prompt field like in 10.04 9.04 etc so that i can login as root. The irritating bit is that using this way to login does not save my choice of the GNOME Classic Desktop as my default choice. If there is a way to move Unity to the bottom of the list then I will try that option.

Any way thank you to everyone for their contributions to my post.

Regards
Philip

[3Miro]

@Philip Gray: please be more polite to people that volunteer their own time to help you with your issues. There is no need for name calling and if you want rant with nonsense about Unity and MS, there are thousands of useless threads ranting about it already, there is really nothing that you can contribute.

You can remove Unity and in no way or whatsoever does Unity prevent you from using other desktop environments. There are many other variations of Ubuntu that use other environments. The only problem is that, if you don't know what you are doing, then there is a good chance that you will break things.

Go to the Software Center and install Synaptic Package Manager. Synaptic a tool with many options to micromanage the installed software. Then you can search and remove anything that has to do with Unity and Compiz, however, keep an eye on what else is being uninstalled as you may end up with a broken system.

[Philip Gray]

To 3Miro

Take a chill pill. I take great exception to your comments. It is uncalled for, insulting and is unacceptable. Nowhere in my comment did I insult the people that spend their time developing to make Linux a good product. I salute them,

Furthermore you seemed to have missed the point that I am excrcising my democratic right to free expression.

You missed the subtle point that I do not agree with the direction the Ubuntu Desktop developers are taking the desktop environment. They are sacrificing the power users to accommodate the newbies. I take exception to that.

Unlike you I am not having a rant. From my point of view with each new version of Ubuntu the power users are being disadvantaged due to useful functionality being removed.

[nothingspecial]

I think we'll leave this here.