Ubuntu
gedit package

is removing gedit safe?

Asked by eposse

I'd like a clean reinstall of gedit as I am having some issues with the External Tools plugin, but simply choosing "reinstall" gedit and gedit-common in either Synaptic or by doing "sudo apt-get --reinstall install gedit gedit-common" doesn't solve my problem. So I was trying to remove gedit and then install it again. But when I use Synaptic to mark gedit for removal, it also marks "ubuntu-desktop" for removal (but I don't want to remove the ubuntu-desktop, of course). So I have two questions:

1) Why does Synaptic mark ubuntu-desktop for removal if other packages depend on it as well?
2) Is it safe to remove gedit, or that will actually remove the gnome desktop?

Thanks

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George Standish (george-standish-deactivatedaccount) said : 		#1

eposse,

"ubuntu-desktop" is known as a Meta package, it doesn't actually install/contain anything itself, it just links to all the requirements for the regular Ubuntu desktop system. Whenever a package that is in the "base" Ubuntu Desktop install, is removed this package will be removed.

It is safe to let gedit remove ubuntu-desktop. But may I suggest, rather then reinstalling gedit after the removal, reinstall ubuntu-desktop and it will pull gedit back in as well.

Having ubuntu-destkop installed IS important if you are upgrading your system from one release to the next!

Hope this clarifies things a little for you,
George

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actionparsnip (andrew-woodhead666) said : 		#2

You can remove gedit if you wish, the "ubuntu-desktop" packe will be needed if you lan to upgrade to the next release but if you clean install each time then who cares.

As George says, removing meta-packages only does that, it will not remove the entire desktop from your system.

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GREG T. (ubuntuer) said : 		#3

it you just want to clean your system check out bleachbit it`s does a pretty good job.

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actionparsnip (andrew-woodhead666) said : 		#4

You can also remove other apps like openoffice.org and install abiword if you only use writer, you can also remove gimp if you never use it as well as vinagre and vino if you don't use vnc

if you run:

dpkg -l | less

and read through, remove anything you don't use. I have a script to clean out what i never use and my install is 2.7Gb which is tiny

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