Ubuntu 18.04 – Upgraded but Still Have Old UI

18.04desktop-environmentsgnomeunity

I just upgraded to Ubuntu 18.04 but the UI did not change at all. For example I don't have the full screen app launcher; it's the same as it was back in 16 and 17. No notification center etc.

Do I need to somehow opt in?

Best Answer

When you were running Ubuntu 16.04 you were on the Unity interface. After upgrading to 18.04 the Unity interface is still there but new interfaces are offered as well. It sounds like you are searching for the Gnome Desktop which you can select from the "gear" next to the Sign In button during login:

You can try all the desktops to see which you like best but keep in mind:

Many have reported problems using the Wayland window manager which was designed to replace X11 but has not lived up to expectations.
When I tested 18.04 upgrade of 16.04 clone some of the options resulted in a purple screen with only a movable mouse cursor.

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – Get rid of unity desktop on Ubuntu 18.04

Issue the command

sudo apt install --reinstall ubuntu-desktop

At some point, you will be asked which display manager to use. The gdm display manager is the default for gnome. After installing Unity, you have switched to lightdm.

After logging out and logging back into the default Ubuntu session with the gnome desktop, you can remove the unity session by uninstalling "unity-session":

sudo apt purge unity-session

Further cleanup may be obtained by autoremove:

sudo apt autoremove

This removes all packages that were automatically installed to satisfy dependencies for "unity-session".

Ubuntu – Ubuntu 18.04: Gnome lock screen refuse correct password

I have the same issue and tried a lot of solutions offered around the internet. So far, the only work around that worked when this happens:

Alt+Ctrl+F1 - switch to a different console and login as your user
sudo killall gnome-screensaver - to kill the screensaver
Alt+Ctrl+F7 - switch back to your X screen, there will no longer be a screensaver
gnome-screensaver-command -l to lock your screen again and now unlock with your password (it should work now)

Note that if I don't do #4, the screen continue to go blank after a few minutes of being logged in, which is why I figured I needed to do #4.

Edit from 2020: Yet another alternative, inspired by EChip's answer: setup a cron script that will switch language back to English when the screen lock dialog is detected:

# Allows to avoid situation when on screen lock language other than
# English is selected.
#
# Set up under user's cron like this:
# * * * * * env DISPLAY=:0 /bin/bash /storage/scripts/unlock_helper.sh > /home/your_user_name/log.txt 2>&1
#
# Prerequisite:
# Add the following line to you .profile:
#    set | grep DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS > ~/.DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS

source /home/your_user_name/.DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS
export DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS
echo $DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS

if (/usr/bin/gnome-screensaver-command -q | /bin/grep "is active");
then
    /usr/bin/gdbus call --session --dest org.gnome.Shell \
        --object-path /org/gnome/Shell \
        --method org.gnome.Shell.Eval \
        "imports.ui.status.keyboard.getInputSourceManager().inputSources[0].activate()"
fi

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – Get rid of unity desktop on Ubuntu 18.04

Ubuntu – Ubuntu 18.04: Gnome lock screen refuse correct password

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