Missing launcher after 12.04 upgrade

Question

I recently upgraded to Ubuntu 12.04 and after doing some updates and such my application launcher and title bars (for window dialogues) are missing. Basically the entire Unity GUI is missing!

Not sure what happened so I installed GNOME 3 and it was missing a launcher too, but did have title bars. In addition the bar found at the top that lets you know what's open and allows GNOME extensions to be displayed is not interactive. I can't click, right click, alt + click (right or left), alt + super click (right or left) anywhere! I even installed an application menu from the GNOME site and it is not interactive either. However, since there is no way to launch applications I have to use terminal and if I minimize an app it will disappear completely.

Then I decided to try Unity 2D and it is incredibly messed up. Black background, launcher is there but icons and top bar while on desktop are completely distorted. They're not just pixelated; they're all sorts of funky colors and when I open something from Unity 2D launcher it will show it's opened in the launcher but nothing appears on my screen.

When trying to view videos on YouTube the video is distorted and looks just as Unity 2D does. Strange enough: the audio works fine, just not videos. Pictures loads, but not ads that stream video.

Any suggestions to get my launcher and the Unity GUI back? I tried reinstalling GNOME, Unity 3D, and Unity 2D from terminal. No change. Also reinstalled Unity desktop and tried resetting it: nothing happened.

Answer 1

I had the same problem. I tried with unity --reset (as it used to fix things when I messed things up before with compiz-config) but that didn't solve my problem now. The only thing I could do for getting everything working as normal was to reset compiz settings.

Just backup (rename) ~/.compiz-1 and ~/.config/compiz-1 directories and let them to be created again with the default settings (you'll need to logout and log back in again).

mv ~/.compiz-1 ~/.compiz-1.BACKUP
mv ~/.config/compiz-1 ~/.config/compiz-1.BACKUP

After having restarted and confirmed that everything works as expected, you can simply remove these backups (unless you have a use for them).

rm -Rfv ~/.compiz-1.BACKUP
rm -Rfv ~/.config/compiz-1.BACKUP

---

Note: To some people, one of the following links might have the solution. Try them if you don't want to lose all your compiz customizations.

• Unity doesn't load, no Launcher, no Dash appears
• How do I reset my Unity configuration?

In my case just resetting Unity wasn't enough, so I decided to get rid of all compiz settings.

Answer 2

I had the same problem. I tried this.

1. Press Ctrl+Alt+F1 to switch to the CLI/tty.

2. Check if unity package installed:

   dpkg -l | grep unity
   

   If 'unity' is listed in the output, proceed with the next step. If not, install it (and its dependencies):

   sudo apt-get update
   sudo apt-get install unity
   

3. Check if 'ubuntu-desktop' installed:

   dpkg -l | grep ubuntu-desktop
   

   if not, install it:

   sudo apt-get update
   sudo apt-get install ubuntu-desktop
   

4. Restart your display manager.

   If you're a Natty user, you need to restart GDM:

   sudo service gdm restart
   

   or if you're on Oneiric and later you need to restart LightDM instead (default):

   sudo service lightdm restart
   

Answer 3

Simon's method works if you are not able to open terminal you can work in login shells(virtual consoles). @erik you could have done it in any virtual consoles

ctrl+alt+F1-6

I think it would have worked.

Answer 4

In my case I had an old .gnomerc file that seemed to be the culprit. Probably from some very old compiz install (circa 2008). Removing the file solved the problem for me, may help someone else.

File was:

cat .gnomerc
export LIBGL_ALWAYS_INDIRECT=1

rm ~/.gnomerc and reboot or log out/in.

Answer 5

If you have a blank screen and nothing else apart from the mouse, you should still be able to call up terminal.

If so, install CCSM if you haven't already done so:

sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager 

Then once it's installed, in the same terminal just do:

ccsm

When the manager GUI pops up, go to desktop/ubuntu unity plugin and make sure it's enabled.

If it's already enabled, disable and then re-enable, log out and log back in and all should be back to normal.

If you have the issue where Compiz continues to crash at boot, simply create a shell script:

sleep 3
compiz --replace
end

You can then simply add this to your start up applications and it will reset Compiz on boot, obviously making sure you have made the file executable first though.

Answer 6

Removing the Compiz directories worked for me, but since I could not get a terminal, I had to do the following:

1. Boot Ubuntu Live from a CD
2. Open a terminal window and issue 'sudo -s' to get root privileges (no password required)
3. do a df command to see the drives on the system (it will be a long name....)
4. cd /media/[drive name]
5. cd [your normal home directory]

Now you can rename the compiz directories as per above. Shut down the live session, remove the CD and boot from the hard disk.

It worked for me. YMMV.

1. if you have no live cd by hand just press CTRL+ALT+T
2. for hack more:
   • create launch.sh with right mouse button on the desktop with text "gnome-terminal" in it (without quotes).
   • Set executable bit for this script in properties with RMB.
   • Execute it.

Answer 7

Thank you! After upgrading to Precise, Unity was disabled (although not at first).

Installing compizconfig-settings-manager , running it via ccsm and applying the necessary changes to start Unity again did the trick!

Answer 8

All you have to do is; Start Ubuntu tweak, go to Tweaks menu, select Desktop Icons, and change Show Desktop Icons to On.

and that's it!