Gnome Panels not Visible

Question

Sometimes, when logging into my PC, some or all of my Gnome panels fail to appear, so I'm left with a blank screen and no way to log out/shutdown or run any programs. Why haven't the panels appeared? How can I get them back? I can sometimes create a new panel and add a new launcher to it to reboot, but it's a bit of a long winded solution. I'm using the 10.04 LTS release.

Answer 1

Well , I had script for resetting the gnome panel . I am not sure if this script will work on notebook version , i used it in desktop version ,and its very helpful .

save this script to PanelRestore.sh to the desktop for example and chmod +x PanelRestore.sh and then run it by terminal ./PanelRestore.sh , a new window will pop up , just click restore default setting and you would be good to go

#!/bin/sh
#
# GNOME Panel Save / Restore
# Writen by PhrankDaChicken
#
# http://ubuntu.online02.com
#
#
# Updated to add restore defaults by jimjimovich
# http://www.starryhope.com
#
#


DIR=$(pwd)
TITLE="PanelRestore"

Main () {
    CHOICE=$(zenity --list --title "$TITLE" --hide-column 1 --text "What do you want to do?" --column "" --column "" \
"0" "Save Panel Settings" \
"1" "Restore Panel Settings" \
"2" "Restore Default Panel Settings")
    if [ $CHOICE = 0 ]; then
        Panel_Save
    fi
    if [ $CHOICE = 1 ]; then
        Panel_Restore
    fi
    if [ $CHOICE = 2 ]; then
        Panel_Defaults
    fi  
}

Panel_Restore () {
    FILE=$(zenity --title "$TITLE: Open File" --file-selection --file-filter "*.xml" )
    if [ -n "$FILE" ]; then 
        gconftool-2 --load "$FILE"
        killall gnome-panel
    fi
    Main
}

Panel_Save () {
    FILE=$(zenity --title "$TITLE: Save File" --file-selection --save --confirm-overwrite --filename "Gnome_Panel.xml" --file-filter "*.xml" )
    if [ -n "$FILE" ]; then 
        EXT=$(echo "$FILE" | grep "xml")
        if [ "$EXT" = "" ]; then
            FILE="$FILE.xml"
        fi
        gconftool-2 --dump /apps/panel > $FILE
        zenity --info --title "$TITLE: File Saved" --text "File saved as: \n $FILE"
    fi
    Main
}

Panel_Defaults () {
    zenity --question --text="Are you sure you want to restore the default top and bottom panels?"
    gconftool-2 --recursive-unset /apps/panel
    rm -rf ~/.gconf/apps/panel
    pkill gnome-panel
    exit
}

Main

# END OF Script

Answer 2

1. Press ALT+F2 and in the run dialog box, type gnome-terminal

In the terminal, type

gconftool-2 — – shutdown (no space between the dashes and no space between the dash and the word ‘shutdown’)

1. rm -rf ~/.gconf/apps/panel

2. pkill gnome-panel

Answer 3

try running this command

gnome-panel

Check if your panels are restored.

Answer 4

You can restart the panels by typing

killall gnome-panel