no menus or menu panels in ubuntu 11.04

Asked by Timothy

I upgraded to ubuntu 11.04 with the automatic installer... when I booted my system for the first time, there was no way to access my 'applications' or my system menus... scrolling to the left or right or top left or top right didn't do anything..

a transparent panel bar was at the top of my screen... I could access the calendar and the 'shut down options' by guessing where they were, but they had no graphic display...

I found an article somewhere here which spoke of a similar problem... the person wanted their old menus back, the ubuntu 10 style....

they were told to type ' sudo apt-get remove appmenu-gtk ' into terminal... I now have no menus of any kind, and cannot graphically access any software except by making shortcuts on the desktop...

maybe I need to re-install those packages... but how?

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Ubuntu unity Edit question
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Timothy
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jax2_0 (jax2-0) said :
#1

ctrl - alt - T will open a terminal, allowing you to paste/type the command line you mentioned, perhaps that will help you?

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jax2_0 (jax2-0) said :
#2

I actually had this happen to me (due to messing with Ubuntu Tweak) and was searching for a way to fix it. All that I did to restore my panels was this.

crtl - alt- T (to open the terminal)

then type

gnome - panel (if you feel a bit under-whelmed at the solution it's ok, I felt a bit stupid at the simplicity of it as well).

Hopefully this works for you as it did for I,
Jax2_0

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Timothy (t-smith) said :
#3

neato... my panels are working now... I went into that 'package configuration' delie and installed some more unity and appmenu packages... one of them seems to have jogged the process...

thank you for your quick response...

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jax2_0 (jax2-0) said :
#4

To add to my list of comments (since I appear to be hindering as much as helping) I will add that the above does not fix anything, it just RUNS the gnome panel (the old 10.10 and previous panel). Sadly I did not know this when I answered previously, but at least it gets your panel back until you decide to exit the terminal.

To restore Unity (11.04's default panel) go to the Software Center and type Unity into the search bar. By default Unity is installed, click Remove. After in un-installs click the Install button, after this your screen should flash as your desktop and windows disappear; they reappear with the Unity panel a few seconds later.

As I have steered you wrong in the past I DID test this out before hand, and it is working so far. Obviously I have a lot to learn about helping users, but at least I (as well as you) are learning.

Jax2_0

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inaudible friend (subliminallybetter) said :
#5

You have no idea how helpful this thread was. I upgraded about three hours ago and to be honest I wish I would have just stuck with 10.10.. i have no windows borders AT ALL but at least now i can manage to get into to ccsm ( totally changed ) i went to turn on compositing so docky would stop blacking out half of my screen. but that did not work so i quit docky and compositing . during the process of turning compositing on i managed to disable the unity dock ( it sucks anyway but thanks to you guys i halfway have gnome panel back so the unity panel is not a big deal )

my issue now is that i still have no window borders .. i figure that it might be something to do with CCSM because even when i was using 9.04 it did that when i would have to force quit compiz . .

I reset my compiz settings, and reboot but still no windows borders . also with having no window borders i can't so much as move a window or resize ... if anyone has any idea what the hell i'm to do about it i would be very thankful and so would my laptop.. it already hit the wall twice tonight

i have never been so pissed about Ubuntu anything.. this distribution acts like bill gates created it

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Harry Skelton (skelton-harry) said :
#6

I need my menus back too. This should not be listed as "solved".