Been away

[buttie2]

I'm not new to ubuntu I've just been abroad for a while. Someplace tropical where internet connections are few and far between pina coladas can be had for next to nothing and the beaches are so far out..
What I mean is I heard that guis have changed ( it's been a while ) so could somebody please point me at a list of guis available with the latest of the LTSs so I can get the general idea before diving in and installing?

[Toz]

Hello and welcome to the forums.

If by "guis" you mean desktop environments, then you can probably get any of them to work with Ubuntu. However, if you're referring to the official derivatives, then have a look here. (http://www.ubuntu.com/about/about-ubuntu/derivatives)

[vasa1]

.... a list of guis available with the latest of the LTSs so I can get the general idea before diving in and installing?
In a few days (probably Apr 17), most official Ubuntu flavors will release their latest LTS versions (14.04).

[buttie2]

In a few days (probably Apr 17), most official Ubuntu flavors will release their latest LTS versions (14.04).

Thank you for that interesting piece of information. I will play around with the previous LTS until then

[su:bhatta]

If you have been away really long, then you should be made aware that Gnome is not the default DE for Ubuntu.
Unity is, which is based on Gnome3.
But with Unity, i believe you get Gnome Classic session, which might be familiar to you.

Other things are ubuntu Gnome is available, which will give you Gnome3 shell in Ubuntu.
Kubuntu, Xubuntu & others remain same.

Medibuntu is gone BTW.

[grahammechanical]

This is a link to the online Ubuntu 14.04 desktop guide. It is installed as part of a Ubuntu installation.

https://help.ubuntu.com/14.04/ubuntu-help/index.html

This will show you what the Gnome 3 Shell looks like. It is used in Ubuntu Gnome which in turn is attempting to show what Ubuntu would look like if the developers did not choose Unity over Gnome 3 Shell.

http://www.gnome.org/gnome-3/

By the way, in Ubuntu 14.04 we install gnome-session-flashback to get a desktop session that looks like (but actually is not) the old Gnome 2 panel. What is now called Gnome Classic is acually a Gnome 3 Shell extension and it is better fitting to be installed on Ubuntu Gnome.

This is what Kubuntu looks like

http://www.kubuntu.org/feature-tour

This is Xubuntu

http://xubuntu.org/screenshots/

And here you will find Lubuntu

http://lubuntu.net/

Regards.

[buttie2]

If you have been away really long, then you should be made aware that Gnome is not the default DE for Ubuntu.
Unity is, which is based on Gnome3.
But with Unity, i believe you get Gnome Classic session, which might be familiar to you.

You are so right! Things have changed so much I couldn't do a thing with it. Couldn't find anything. How do I get the Gnome Classic session? There were no alternative desktops available at the log in prompt





By the way, in Ubuntu 14.04 we install gnome-session-flashback to get a desktop session that looks like (but actually is not) the old Gnome 2 panel. What is now called Gnome Classic is acually a Gnome 3 Shell extension and it is better fitting to be installed on Ubuntu Gnome.



Please tell me in simple terms how to get the gnome-session-flashback. I think I will have to catch up in easy steps here

[buttie2]

Ok. Cracked it.

Software Centre in Unity let me install synaptic which let me install gnome-session-flashback. Switched to flashback and installed Mate 1.8.