This is a question in general. Sometimes when using Natty, the interface freezes like the keyboard works but the mouse does respond. In which case pressing Ctrl+Alt+F1 puts me at the terminal. However I do not know how to load the GUI and Unity and continue using Ubuntu. At present I just shutdown properly and restart.
I have no expertise in this regard, which is probably why some of the terms I use could be wrong. Please correct me if necessary.
How do I restart the Xserver or GUI(Gnome and Unity) when I press Ctrl+Alt+F1?
Best Answer
There are a few ways to do this. My personal favourite is to login to the F1 text console as yourself. Then type
This should kill you previous X server and restart it. Sometimes it fails to kill properly, but it will start another X server on tty8 (CTRL + ALT + F8)