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I'm running an up-to-date Ubuntu 14.04, which I frankenstein'd into Xubuntu and up to this point it's been working just fine. When I booted my computer up today, I noticed that a few icons on my dock and panel were missing. However, I am writing this post on the computer of which I speak. So things aren't messed up so bad it's unusable.

What went missing:

  • VLC, Audacity, and some other apps which I have yet to find and probably won't be missed
  • Network and audio indicators (kind of important but my system is still usable)
  • Something in the Bluetooth stack which is causing it not to work
  • Something in PolicyKit, so I can't use GUI packaging tools anymore (doesn't really matter since I use the CLI like a big boy anyway)

What still works:

  • Network Manager, as it connected to my home wifi just fine
  • Mail and power indicators for some inexplicable reason
  • Compiz, which starts automatically on login
  • XFCE itself, so the system is still perfectly usable
  • Pretty much every other app I've installed on my system

What may be causing a problem:

  • I installed my system from an Ubuntu 14.04 disc and frankenstein'd it into Xubuntu (again, it's been working just fine until now, so that's probably not the problem here)
  • I built Vogl for some reason and had to install some development headers (which shouldn't cause a problem) and some Qt5 stuff so it would build - I'm guessing the latter is causing the problem here
  • I did update once or twice after building Vogl

What I've done so far:

  • VLC and Audacity installed without any hiccups. What's weird is that it had to install pretty much all their dependencies along with them.
  • I installed the network indicator back, and it didn't seem to appear again after logging out and logging back in, and even rebooting. What's even weirder is that the package manager wanted to pull the whole Unity 8 stack along with it, even with the --no-install-recommends flag. That thoroughly confuses me. It's as if the dependencies just changed overnight. This is not like Ubuntu, especially for an LTS release.
  • I removed Unity 8, but it pulled the network indicator along with it. Which should be expected, seeing as Unity came along with the network indicator.
  • I even removed the Qt5 stuff I had installed earlier, and that didn't help either. The package manager still wanted to pull in the whole Unity 8 stack, which is not what I want.

Like I said before, this doesn't make my system unusable per se, it's just that I'll be going back to school in a week and need to be able to connect to the wifi there. So that part is kinda important. The sound indicator I don't need necessarily either, because I still have pavucontrol and my media keys to work with.

So my question is now, how can I install the Unity 7 version of the indicators (which had been working just fine in XFCE before this whole fiasco) without pulling in the whole Unity 8 stack? Also, any suggestions for fixing my Bluetooth stack?

UPDATE: I have gotten the network and sound indicators back. I will look elsewhere to fix PolicyKit and Bluetooth, as it seems these problems aren't related to what packages I have installed. Then again, I could be wrong. I will accept the answer that (mostly) worked for me, hopefully someone else gets something out of this.

1 Answer 1

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To install the Unity indicators that are included with the basic Ubuntu Unity installation, run the following command.

sudo apt-get install indicator-appmenu indicator-application indicator-sound indicator-bluetooth indicator-datetime indicator-keyboard indicator-messages indicator-printers indicator-power indicator-session telepathy-indicator

Xfce offers a different set of indicators than Unity. Also, the network-manager indicator is not the same as the "network-indicator". The Unity network-manager indicator is part of one of the complete indicator packages included in Unity. (Unity8 is for Ubuntu touch) Furthermore, xfce4 now offers a panel indicator that specifically displays the complete group of Unity indicators.

Right click on your top panel and select add new item to panel.

enter image description here

You can safely remove Unity8 and all dependencies by running the following commands:

sudo apt-get purge unity8
sudo apt-get autoremove
sudo apt-get autoclean

Finally, if you don't use lightdm or gdm and you are using the startx command to start xfce instead of signing in normally, certain indicators and features won't be available.

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  • Thanks, but you didn't completely answer the question. 1) What package do I need to install to get the network manager indicator back and 2) still... any suggestions on Bluetooth? Aug 15, 2014 at 19:43
  • Also, I do use lightdm. Aug 16, 2014 at 0:12
  • I got the sound indicator reinstalled, and by some stroke of luck I got the network indicator back. See my update in the OP. Aug 16, 2014 at 0:36

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