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I already know that I can uninstall Unity if I'm using Gnome-Shell exclusively, but I'm also wondering if it's safe to uninstall Compiz when I'm only using Gnome-Shell, since as far as I know, Gnome-Shell doesn't use Compiz.

2 Answers 2

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Removing compiz also removes the packages unity & ubuntu-desktop.

Thus you will lose the ability to log into the unity or unity-2d desktops.

ubuntu-desktop is a meta package - normally you would need this to allow a successful upgrade to ubuntu+1. Therefore - just reinstall this package before you next upgrade to 12.04.

On my quick test, removing compiz did not stop me logging out and logging back into gnome-shell. You are correct - gnome-shell does not use compiz as its compositing manager, it uses mutter.

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  • Removing ubuntu-desktop does not remove unity as ubuntu-desktop is a meta-package so it will only bring in packages and most of the time removing the meta-package does not result in a removal of the packages it brings in. Removing compiz will also not result in a complete removal of Unity because unity2d will still remain because it has no dependence on compiz at all, it has no fancy effects (not that Unity normal does either.)
    – Jordon Bedwell
    Commented Nov 16, 2013 at 16:52
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It depends on how much you want to remove and change.

Yes, you can remove compiz, it will take a little work to remove unity and potentially unnecessary packages.

See the linked question on how to remove Unity.

Use the following to remove all compiz related packages:

sudo apt-get purge compiz compiz-plugins-main-default libcompizconfig0

If you do not want to do all this, you can re-install and try the gnome 3 remix

See the UGR (Ubuntu Gnome Remix)

https://launchpad.net/ubuntugnome

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UGR

UGR Home page (check the LP and wiki page if you think this link is spam) http://ugr.teampr0xy.net/

Linked Question:

  1. How can you remove Unity?
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  • Thanks for that list of packages to uninstall. That'll be helpful if I decide to ditch Unity, which may or may not happen over this weekend. Or maybe Christmas break when I actually have some free time, lol.
    – Icedrake
    Commented Dec 12, 2011 at 23:26
  • Definitely review that list, I am not sure how much or little you wish to remove, and you will not do any harm by leaving compiz and unity installed.
    – Panther
    Commented Dec 12, 2011 at 23:27
  • @fossfreedom - my list is unity + compiz, not sure how you would feel best to edit my response.
    – Panther
    Commented Dec 12, 2011 at 23:35

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