A few days ago, when I decided that my 5GB partition for Ubuntu is getting a bit too crowded with all kinds of applications, I uninstalled a bunch of software through synaptic. Well, one of them is Evolution. I freed about 1GB of hard drive space. However, disaster stroke, everything disappeared from my desktop. I saw nothing on my desktop, no menus, no icons, no panels and not even my beloved desktop background but a smooth orange background. I freaked out. After several restarts, things did not help at all.

I needed to get online for some help, and the only way to do that was to open Firefox. So I opened terminal -> Ctrl+Shift+T (Thank god for the shortcut, otherwise I’m dead). Typed in firefox, it opened firefox! nice. Now, this guy had a similar problem, and the solution seemed very simple. I posted it here.

Problem

After uninstalling several packages in Synaptic, the desktop just goes blank and there is nothing, not even icons or panels.

Solution

We need to reinstall ubuntu-desktop, this will reinstall all the default packages.

1. Hold down Ctrl+Alt+F1
2. Login
3. Enter
   

   sudo apt-get install ubuntu-desktop

4. After you are done, return to x-server by Alt+F7 or just restart.

Interestingly enough, if you would like to have packages installed in Kbuntu or other distribution, there you can do so with a similar process as above. The only thing different is it would be Kbuntu-desktop (or else) instead of Ubuntu-desktop. Check Synaptic.

Ok, that is it.

Filed under: Firefox, Howto, Terminal, troubleshooting, Ubuntu | Tagged: desktop, Ubuntu |