Ubuntu
gnome-panel package

Status tool bar is gone

Asked by Julie Johnson

I was deleting applications to make more room on hard drive. Now I have no status bar on top for my Home Icon or Ubuntu Icon. I can't get into my system or see any of my status notifications (battery, wireless connection, date and time) I'm not sure what I've done.

I'm not computer savvy by any means, so I need some help.

Thanks,
J. Johnson

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Ubuntu gnome-panel Edit question
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Tom
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Tom (tom6) said : 		#1

When you are booting up do you get a menu with several different options for booting into Ubuntu? The 2nd option should have "recovery mode" near the end of it's line?

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Julie Johnson (julraejohn) said : 		#2

No. I have no options when Ubuntu is loading. It just goes straight to my launch panels

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Julie Johnson (julraejohn) said : 		#3

I have a Dell 9" Inspiron if that helps anyone help me. I can't do anything until I get that 'toolbar' or whatever it is called back,. I can't get to my systems, places, administration...nothing. I can't figure out how to get there without the icons. I don't even know how to reboot. If I restart it goes straight to my Ubuntu screen...How do I reboot and try to 'recover'?

J. Johnson

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Larry Jordan (larryjor) said : 		#4

     I'm guessing you are using gnome, which is the default. What you are referring to is called the gnome-panel in that case; it uses files:
     /usr/bin/gnome-panel
     /usr/lib/gnome-panel
     /usr/share/gnome-panel

     If you might have deleted any of these, you'll have a problem getting them back. Best bet is to re-install Ubuntu. If that gives you an option, try using upgrade current installation, which will simply add everything back in.

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Julie Johnson (julraejohn) said : 		#5

Great! I would love to do that! I don't have much on this computer so I don't need anything if I actually lose data.

My next problem; how do I re-install Ubuntu? My husband bought my little Inspiron pre-loaded. Can I just install the latest version and call it good? I don't have a disk or anything like that....

I'm computer illiterate, so pardon my dumb question. Thank you for your help.

J. Johnson

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Best Tom (tom6) said : 		#6

If ubuntu was pre-installed and you have no Ubuntu cd then it might be better to try a slightly more elegant answer. Try pressing Alt and F2 to bring up a tiny command-line. Into that type

gksudo synaptic

it will ask for your normal user password, not your SuperUser/Root one. In synaptic notice that all programs/libraries/codecs (we call them packages) that are already installed are marked with a green splodge. Either search tool is good but i prefer the "Search" button because it searches in package descriptions as well as titles so it lets me be a lot more vague. Try a search for "gnome-panel". To install or reinstall something try right-clicking on it and choose "install". Many packages depend on other packages in order to be able to run but you usually have most of what's needed already installed. The package manager will hunt for which dependencies are missing and ask if it can install those too. Finally, when all the packages you want to install have been selected click on the "Apply" button.

Hopefully now all your gnome-panel will look normal again :)
Good luck with this, regards from
Tom :)

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Julie Johnson (julraejohn) said : 		#7

Whoever changed my question to 'gnome panel' thank you thank you thank you!!!

Tom,
You are a God-send. I was unable to get the tiny command line up with the Alt and F2. But, while messing around with this yesterday I found a way to get into the terminal to put in the command you gave me!!! I used ctrl alt bkspc to restart and one of my options is to start in failsafe terminal. WWWOOHHHOOOO I was able to put Gnome back on. I'm sure I added more than what was required, but everything is now back!!!

Thank you for your time!! Do you ever sleep? You helped me yesterday too and this answer came in the middle of the night!

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Julie Johnson (julraejohn) said : 		#8

Thank you to all who had a hand in helping me. Changing the problem to 'gnome panel' was the key!

Thanks again.

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Tom (tom6) said : 		#9

Brilliant :))) Nicely done and well found ;))

I think we might be in a different time-zones, i'm in England. Gnome-panel probably did need a couple of extra things to work, we call these dependencies and they tend to be very small packages which are often then shared by many other programs so hopefully that's fixed a few things :) I would go back into synaptic

System - Administration - Synaptic

and this time click on the "Edit" menu and "Fix broken packages" just to completely fix everything, also a "Mark all updates" before clicking on "Apply" might help :) Synaptic is great for finding extra goodies, especially with the "Search" button allowing you to be a bit vague. It helps me anyway ;)

Anyway, great to hear you've fixed it :)))
Welcome to linux-land, especially the Ubuntu corner :)
Regards from
Tom :)

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Tom (tom6) said : 		#10

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SwitchingToUbuntu/FromWindows

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Larry Jordan (larryjor) said : 		#11

     Julie,
     My daughter had this same problem on her login after I had helped you with it. I've posted it as a bug report in bugzilla and been told it was already reported as bug # 429493. The original author of the bug has some pretty good ideas on fixes, and I've added my own.
    Thought I would let you know in case you wanted to add yourself to the threads for it and get cc'd in email about it. You can look it up at http://bugzilla.gnome.org if you would like to add your voice to the complaint.