I removed ubuntu-desktop, and ran "apt autoremove". Computer still booting, lxqt environment is still working wonderfully.
Anybody else who tries it please note that some amount of duplicate software is nevertheless left behind, which can be uninstalled manually, including, but not limited to, Nautilus, file roller, Thunderbird, etc.
Look at the manifest. It specifies all the snaps and snap-associated packages that would be installed.
gir1.2-snapd-1:amd64 1.49-0ubuntu1
gnome-software-plugin-snap 3.30.6-2ubuntu10
libsnapd-glib1:amd64 1.49-0ubuntu1
snapd 2.41+19.10.1
snap:core stable 7917
snap:core18 stable 1223
snap:gnome-3-28-1804 stable/ubuntu-19.10 71
snap:gnome-calculator stable/ubuntu-19.10 501
snap:gnome-characters stable/ubuntu-19.10 317
snap:gnome-logs stable/ubuntu-19.10 81
snap:gtk-common-themes stable/ubuntu-19.10 1353
The fact that you deleted them in 19.04 shouldn't have affected what's installed in 19.10 but that doesn't seem to be the case.
In 19.04, if you run sudo apt purge snapd
, doing so would remove, in addition to snapd
, the snaps presently installed on your system. Now, if you run sudo do-release-upgrade
, neither snapd
nor any snaps are installed. Two users, here, and here, have verified this. I also checked, in a VM, that the upgrade from 19.04 to 19.10 didn't reinstall snaps or snapd
, if sudo apt purge snapd
was run before sudo apt purge snapd
.
Whether this situation will persist if users eventually upgrade from 19.10 to 20.04 is unclear.
However, there's a comment over at discourse.ubuntu.com worth reading. Quoting from there:
This just sounds like a feature request in the upgrade tool.
Essentially if the user has already removed a snap, and installed the
deb of the application, then an upgrade happens they get a thing back
that they removed.
However, I’m not sure the upgrade tools have the intelligence to know
that you previously removed the snap, and don’t want it back. Further,
the point of the upgrade tool is to take you to the new release. Those
snaps are part of the new release. I have a feeling if you removed
firefox from 19.04 and upgraded to 19.10, you’d get firefox back.
Which is a similar use case that you’re describing.
That comment indicates that snaps should be reinstalled which isn't what we, who purged snapd
see.
(I would also point out that before upgrading to 19.10, I purged several fonts I don't need. They too were not re-installed.)
Re.
What makes these snap applications better?
Martin Wimpress is the new Desktop Director of Ubuntu. He talks about the rationale behind snaps in this video: Future of Ubuntu & Unpacking Snaps with Martin Wimpress | Part 2 | IG Talks ep. 4.
Best Answer
TL;DR
It is a bug, I have reported it to launchpad to notify the developers about the problem.
As temporary solution you can switch icon theme using GNOME Tweaks → Appearance to one of the following icon sets:
to get normal close button appearance:
Analysis
Seems to be a real bug of Snap and theming of such applications on GNOME DE.
I got the same issue using fresh Ubuntu 19.10 installation on VirtualBox with GNOME FlashBack and Adwaita GTK and icon themes.
I have tested all themes (full list from
ls /usr/share/themes/ -1
) and all icons (full list ofls /usr/share/icons/ -1
) which were listed in GNOME Tweaks → Appearance tab and can conclude that many icon sets are broken:The icon set from above list render garbage on the close button.
The list of correct icon sets is very short:
You can test themes and icon sets on your machine with script below:
Or use GNOME Tweaks to switch themes and icon sets.