How do I adjust my window buttons to the left or right?

Question

I'm trying to use gconf-editor to make an adjustment to my Windows. In the past I had the close,min,max to the "RIGHT". Now I'd like to switch back to the "LEFT". The old way doesn't seem to be working for me. I tried gconf-editor, but I get errors. I did a fresh install of 11.10, but I had my home in another partition. Not sure if my old settings are causing the issue. Can anyone make a suggestion?

** (gconf-editor:2397): WARNING **: Index value is too large

(gconf-editor:2397): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: g_object_get_valist: property type' of object classGConfEditorWindow' is not readable

(gconf-editor:2397): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: g_object_get_valist: property type' of object classGConfEditorWindow' is not readable GConf Error: Configuration server couldn't be contacted: D-BUS error: Method "AllDirs" with signature "s" on interface "org.gnome.GConf.Database" doesn't exist

** (gconf-editor:2397): WARNING **: Index value is too large

GConf Error: Configuration server couldn't be contacted: D-BUS error: Method "AllDirs" with signature "s" on interface "org.gnome.GConf.Database" doesn't exist

Answer 1

What about this command:

gconftool -s /apps/metacity/general/button_layout -t string menu:minimize,maximize,close

Answer 2

Try removing gconf-editor and all its configuration files and then reinstalling.

sudo apt-get --purge remove gconf-editor
sudo apt-get install gconf-editor

If that doesn't work, you should look to deleting old setting as these maybe causing many problems, including this one. I also have a separate /home partition but always erase config folders/files when upgrading to a new version.