Missing “Applications”, “Places” or “System” Menus? How to Reset Ubuntu’s “Classic” Gnome 2/3 Panel

Ubuntu has moved on to “Unity“, and Gnome has evolved to version 3‘s “Gnome Shell“, but many people (like myself) still prefer to use the old “Classic” desktop – be it the old Gnome 2 version, or the “Fallback Mode” of Gnome 3 (users of 11.10 upwards have no choice but to use the Gnome 3 version).

While the 2 versions of the “Classic” interface do have some differences – no “System” menu in Gnome 3 (read this if this is your only concern), and having to hold Alt while right-clicking it to access options – both have panels that are much more customisable (and infinitely more useful) than what “Unity” and “Gnome Shell” currently offer.

But things can go awry, like after doing some tweaking, or installing a program, or having to do a hard reboot, and you can find your panel altered (particularly minus the menus), or even completely missing. So we’ll look at a few different scenarios, and how to rectify them, including how to force Gnome to reset your menus back to their defaults (which is probably the quickest and easiest method). Also, because I’ve seen a lot of newbies in forums say “My Applications menu is missing!” when they should be saying “My top panel has totally vanished!”, we’ll look at how to get your panel back as well.

Finally, because some will need to take a harder approach (or just prefer an easier one), we’ll look at how to totally reset your panels back to their defaults. This is by far the most drastic measure, but it’s quick and easy, and for most people there are no customisations to worry about losing. Besides, if your panel has totally died or vanished, and nothing else you’ve tried has worked, then it’s the only option left.

Try A Quick Panel Restart:

First off, it might be enough to simply refresh the panel by forcing it to close then re-open, which can be done by a reboot, or logging out, or simply entering the following command into the terminal or via Alt+F2:

killall gnome-panel

It pays to do that first, in case that’s all that’s really needed, but chances are you’ve already tried logging out or rebooting, so check out the following tips.

Restore Missing Menus to Panel:

If just your main menu (the “Applications” and “Places” menus, and the “System” menu in Gnome 2) is missing, then perhaps all you need to do is add the menu back to your panel. Right-click an empty area of your panel (holding Alt in Gnome 3) and choose “Add to Panel…“, then scroll down till you find “Menu Bar” (ignore “Main Menu“, as that is a small icon version), and drag it to the left area of your panel.

If it’s conceivable that you perhaps accidentally right-clicked the menu and hit “Remove From Panel“, then it might pay to do this, especially if you have panel customisations you don’t want to lose.

Force Reset of Main Menus:

If you can’t add the menus back to your panel, for example you can’t invoke “Add to Panel…” with a right-click, it’s time to reset the menus to their defaults, which is done by deleting some configuration files. Actually, technically you’re not deleting anything, as the 2 files in question are simply renamed with .bak extensions [so they’re still there if you really need them later], forcing Gnome to recreate those files with default values.

To force Gnome to rewrite its panel menus with default values, enter the following command into a terminal:

mv ~/.config/menus/applications.menu ~/.config/menus/applications.menu.bak && mv ~/.config/menus/settings.menu ~/.config/menus/settings.menu.bak

(That should work with either Gnome 2 or 3, though the settings menu part of it probably won’t do anything in Gnome 3).

All you have to do now is log out, then once you log back in again, your panel should be back with all its menus. Or you can simply enter killall gnome-panel into the terminal and it should successfully refresh your panels without having to log out.

Make a New Top Panel if Missing:

If your panel is absent, you could have even accidentally deleted it yourself, if you unwittingly right-clicked the panel and chose “Delete This Panel” (in Gnome 2 – in Gnome 3 that is harder to do, since you need to be holding Alt while right-clicking the panel). But don’t immediately blame yourself, as all sorts of mishaps can result in a missing panel.

Whatever the case, you should be able to recreate your top panel simply by right-clicking the bottom panel (while holding Alt in Gnome 3) and choosing “New Panel“. You’d then move it to the top, then right-click it (holding Alt in Gnome 3) and choose “Add to Panel…” to add back all the various bits and pieces you had before (the “default” panel is actually a blank panel with a bunch of plugins added).

Obviously, this would be the most time-consuming method, but if you plan to customise your panel anyway, you may as well start from scratch. However, the easiest method would be to totally reset your panels, so keep reading.

Force A Complete Panel Reset:

When all else fails, it’s time to force Gnome to completely reset your panels, which is done by deleting the configuration files. That might sound drastic, and in reality this really is the last resort, but if your panel is totally messed up, chances are your old settings are useless anyway, or rather that having to stick some launchers back on a clean panel will be a welcome alternative to having no panel, or one that is buggy, or missing the “Applications” menu or whatever.

To force Gnome to recreate its panels with default values, enter the following commands into a terminal:

gconftool --recursive-unset /apps/panel (This wipes the panel’s settings)

rm -rf ~/.gconf/apps/panel (This deletes the panel’s folders and files)

killall gnome-panel (This forces the panel to close and restart)

Your panel should now be back with all its menus (but of course minus any customisations). If for some reason they don’t appear immediately, a reboot should fix it.

Alternative Commands for Panel Reset:

ΔΔΔ Some guides have gconftool-2 --shutdown as the first command (this shuts down the current user’s gconfd), though gconftool --recursive-unset /apps/panel should work perfectly fine without it. However, if you aren’t having success, then run it first.

ΔΔΔ If you’re running the commands via the Alt+F2 Run Application box, chances are it won’t like the tilde (~) in the second command, so use rm -rf $HOME/.gconf/apps/panel instead.

ΔΔΔ Instead of killall gnome-panel, you can use pkill gnome-panel (which is basically the same thing), or nohup gnome-panel --replace &, or nohup gnome-panel --replace </dev/null &>/dev/null & (note that nohup specifies the command not halt when the terminal is closed, so is not needed if using Alt+F2).

ΔΔΔ If you’d rather make a backup of the panel’s files before deleting them, run mv ~/.gconf/apps/panel ~/Settings/PanelBackup (note the second path can be whatever you want; in this case, it’s a folder called PanelBackup inside a Settings folder within my home folder I have for storing various config files and settings backup). It actually moves the whole folder to a new location, which is basically the same as deleting it, so you shouldn’t need to run the second command (since there is nothing left there to delete, anyway).

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Ubuntu 11.04 Classic Desktop: How to Log Into The Old Gnome Environment Instead of Unity

Please note: This tip was written specifically for 11.04, which still came with the old Gnome 2 “Classic” desktop as an alternative to Unity. From 11.10 onwards, you will need to install the Gnome 3 Classic desktop, then choose “GNOME Classic” at the login screen. Also note that for any tips asking you to right-click the panel, in Gnome 3 you will need to hold Alt while doing so. And you can ignore the troubleshooting tip at the end, as Gnome 3 does not use Compiz-Fusion.

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Ubuntu‘s new default desktop in 11.04, Unity, was originally designed for the previous Netbook Edition release, with an emphasis on quickly accessing common tasks. While many absolutely love Unity, others aren’t as impressed yet, but admit it is a bold move forward, and will likely win them over as development progresses.

However, many feel it is too much like an annoying smartphone interface that should have stayed in a separate netbook edition, and others yet really have tried to give it a go, but have found it much too confusing. Then there are the rest of us that simply miss the panels we customised and made so useful.

But like with almost everything else about Ubuntu, you have a choice: you can either boot into the default Unity desktop, or to the old familiar Gnome desktop.

This is true even of fresh installs, as the “classic” Gnome 2.x desktop is also installed. Actually, if you upgraded from 10.10, you may have noticed that while it tried to boot into Unity afterwards, it failed, and that’s because Unity wasn’t even installed. Whatever your situation, it’s actually very easy to rectify this. And if you’ve already figured out how to get to the Classic Desktop, but are wondering what happened to all the panels and menus, then read ahead for the answer to that too.

Boot into the Ubuntu Classic Desktop:

When you get to the login screen, you will notice at the bottom there is a menu with the word “Ubuntu” in it. Click the arrow for the menu and you will notice it has a bunch of different login options, with the default being Ubuntu with the Unity desktop. Simply choose “Ubuntu Classic” instead, and proceed to login as usual.

Once you get to the desktop, you will either see your old familiar top panel with menus (if you upgraded), or pretty much a blank panel without menus (if you have a fresh install). If it is the latter, don’t worry, as this is easily rectified. The same is true in case you are missing the bottom panel or “taskbar“.

Restore Menus, Indicators, etc to Top Panel:

Simply right-click an empty area of the panel, choose + Add to Panel…, then scroll down and select Menu Bar, then click Add (or you can just double-click it to add it).

You will see the menu bar appear, with the 3 menus: Applications, Places and System. If the menu bar is not at the far-left (or beginning) of the top panel, just right-click it, choose Move, then drag it to where you want, and click there to finish the placement.

You system tray should be still be intact, as should your indicators, but if not, use + Add to Panel… to add a Notification Area (system tray), Indicator Applet (indicators next to the system tray), Clock (time and date), and Shut Down… (power down and restart options). Or you can use Indicator Applet Complete to restore much of that, including the status menu for instant messaging, and the menu for changing users.

Restore Missing Taskbar, Trash, etc:

If you’re missing the bottom panel, just right-click the top panel, choose New Panel, and a blank one should appear there (if it ends up left or right, just drag it to the bottom). Right-click that and choose + Add to Panel…, and this time choose Window List to restore your taskbar buttons. You can then also add Trash to the far-right, and also Show Desktop on the opposite end.

That should be it, and you should now be enjoying the classic Gnome desktop, which will be the default login option from that point forward.

Troubleshooting:

Are you in the Classic Desktop, but suspect parts of Unity are still there making things wacky? It could be that the Unity plugin for Compiz-Fusion is still activated. To disable it, open System > Preferences > CompizConfig Settings Manager; if it isn’t installed, just run sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager in a terminal.

Once open, scroll down to the Desktop section, where you will see Ubuntu Unity Plugin is enabled. Simply click the check box to the left of it, and it will disable it.

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Restore Missing Volume Button to System Tray After Upgrade to Ubuntu 10.04

Please note: this article is for users of Ubuntu 10.04 through to 11.10 – users of 12.04 onwards read this guide instead.

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If you’ve just upgraded to 10.04 “Lucid Lynx” and found that the volume icon/button is missing from the system tray (at the far-right of the top Gnome panel), there are two ways you can get it back:

Right-click an empty area of the panel, choose Add to Panel, then drag Indicator Applet to next to the clock in the system tray, or wherever you want to put it instead. The volume button will be restored, but as part of the Indicator Applet which also has a mail/message notifier for Evolution and messaging apps, as well as showing when other apps like Rhythmbox music player are open.

OR (if you don’t want to use the Indicator Applet,
but want the old volume button back):

Use Alt+F2 to open the Run Application app, paste gnome-volume-control-applet into the text field, and click the Run button (you can also enter the command into a terminal, but the button will disappear if you close the terminal). To get it to start automatically from the next reboot, go to System > Preferences > Startup Applications and add it as a new entry with a name like “Volume Button”.

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Here are some ways to Customise your Indicator Applet:

Remove Evolution Mail Notifier from Indicator Applet in Ubuntu’s System Tray

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Did this information make your day? Did it rescue you from hours of headache? Then please consider making a donation via PayPal, to buy me a donut, beer, or some fish’n’chips for my time and effort! Many thanks!

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