im on lightdmm i think it was
#cant rightclick or view/create folders
tranquil portal
reinstall cinnamon (just search it by that exact name in synaptic) mark for reinstallation. apply and reboot and see if it helps.
quaint tangle
where do i search it at
tranquil portal
there's a search button in the toolbar
scroll the results til you find exactly the one that just says cinnamon (it should already have a green square)
quaint tangle
will it wipe all my files and can you be more specific? im new to linux. sorry. what toolbar
tranquil portal
open synaptic package manager first
you may then click the Reload button and wait a moment to refresh the catalog
no it wont mess with your own files.
quaint tangle
error popped up
tranquil portal
yeah no biggie if u read it u'll see it's mentioning keys for certain repos u added re: brave
quaint tangle
i see boot-repair
tranquil portal
it will or should still update the catalog for the main repos
then on the far right of toolbar, there is the search button
quaint tangle
got it., green checkbox mext to cinammon
tranquil portal
k follow what i wrote above
quaint tangle
marked cinnamon for reinstall. rebooting.
tranquil portal
did u hit the apply button?
quaint tangle
yes i did
and it reinstalled and i am still unable to rightclick or highlight/view folders
tranquil portal
you can purge cinnamon from the prelogin black screen,
and reinstall it entirely from there
quaint tangle
so search for cinnamon again?
tranquil portal
no
u have to log out,
and enter the real (REAL) terminal at the login manager
called the TTY (oldskool term for teletype - all text mode way they used to handle computers)
quaint tangle
I have cinnamon default. Software rendering Wayland. And various ubuntua
tranquil portal
was it already on cinnamon default?
quaint tangle
Yes it was on default
tranquil portal
for TTY you press ctrl-alt-F4 (or F1-F6)
and to go back to the pretty display manager, ctrl-alt-F7
quaint tangle
Ahh I hate this terminal. I had this with opensuse
tranquil portal
from there you log in in TTY as usual (usual credentials, exact spelling)
quaint tangle
I don't know my username
quaint tangle
Yeah I normally just typing my password
tranquil portal
then just ctrl alt F7 and look
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ok kool
tilde means ur in the home folder. (u can prove that with the pwd command)
quaint tangle
I am in my home folder
tranquil portal
which means print working directory
then to purge out ur desktop u do sudo apt purge cinnamon then read all the output warnings/notices well
quaint tangle
I don't currently have cinnamon to reinstall on a flash drive. Is this going to affect it in any way
quaint tangle
Gotcha
tranquil portal
u may want to check something first
quaint tangle
I ran the command
tranquil portal
is it at a yes/no warning?
quaint tangle
Yup
quaint tangle
I did y
tranquil portal
oof
ok nvm
i was gonna say check if u have internet access in TTY. hopefully u do
quaint tangle
It'll be aight
tranquil portal
so now it's working to erase all the desktop components, right?
tranquil portal
is it done?
check if u have internet. do ping google.com
if it replies a few times, then good. ctrl-c to cancel
quaint tangle
Seven transmitted seven received
tranquil portal
then do sudo apt clean && sudo apt autoclean && sudo apt autoremove to clean out ur existing caches for the apt package manager. all one line, all exact.
quaint tangle
Done
tranquil portal
ok now do sudo apt update to regenerate the package catalog in case the last command got rid of it
and ignore those gpg errors
quaint tangle
It's now installed
tranquil portal
it should probably pull in lightdm
did it pull in a whole bunch of packages? that was rather fast
seems a little too little only 1660 KB for cinnamon
hang on a sec
do a ctrl-alt-F7, see if u can login in the pretty way
and if u got cinnamon working again.
quaint tangle
Yeah cinnamon's working fine like nothing even happened but I still can't right click or do anything with the folder on the desktop
tranquil portal
when you did apt purge cinnamon, what did the warnings say?
did it say it was removing roughly 98 packages?
quaint tangle
How do I scroll up in TTY?
quaint tangle
Should I just Purge it again and see what happens
tranquil portal
ok but do with this command
you will need to logout fully from cinnamon first.
and just be in TTY
quaint tangle
I logged out
I'm on the screen where I put my password in and now I'm on my TTY screen
tranquil portal
then sudo apt purge cinnamon-desktop-environment
it should say it's gonna remove a whole bunch of packages.. about 90ish
quaint tangle
Nothing
tranquil portal
ok try from Synaptic.. log into ur existing hobbled desktop
put xfce, then purge mint entirely after in GUI mode in xfce via synaptic.
then reinstall mint via GUI
quaint tangle
cairo dock xfce
tranquil portal
just xfce4 i think should say it is a meta package to pull in the whole environment
quaint tangle
marked for installation and it checked a bunch of them
tranquil portal
the meta pkg?
quaint tangle
yes
tranquil portal
look at bottom status bar, how many are marked for installation?
quaint tangle
40
tranquil portal
ok.. so as long as u clicked the xfce4 meta package and its description mentioned the whole DE
then hit apply button and wait
quaint tangle
Oh my God awesome! I have access to all of my folders and files on my desktop
So is this just like using cinnamon basically or is it not cinnamon?
tranquil portal
then open synaptic if u wanna purge cinnamon and reinstall it
tranquil portal
So is this just like using cinnamon basically or is it not cinnamon?
it's a different DE
as a sample ^^ ( I don't have cinnamon) when I marked the one in blue there for installation, it adds all the other dependencies.. and u'll notice the status bar says 98 to install)
so to purge, u locate it in much the same way,
and mark the box for "Complete removal"
and it should auto add a whooooole bunch of stuff to remove
quaint tangle
So can I just use this for now for gaming like I play Counter-Strike that's the most intensive game I play
tranquil portal
and also tell you in the final "to be changed" warning how many it's gonna remove.
tranquil portal
So can I just use this for now for gaming like I play Counter-Strike that's the ...
sure
quaint tangle
So I need to unmark it and then I can Mark cinnamon for installation and it'll remove everything
tranquil portal
so to purge, u locate it in much the same way,
like these lines say.
you locate it, mark it for "complete removal"
along with all its dep's
once that's alll done,
quaint tangle
I don't have access to the window button
tranquil portal
u can search synaptic for cinnamon and nothing related should show marked
quaint tangle
The thing that pops up the menu with all my programs
tranquil portal
oh install xfce4 whisker menu from synaptic
quaint tangle
how do i open synaptic
quaint tangle
i do not like xfce at all lol
tranquil portal
it's just cuz it didnt install a menu
this was just rushed for the sake of the other task
see this post: #1306486183810961450 message on how to sort/move panel items.
did u find/install xfce4-whisker ?
whisker menu plugin, whatever the package is named...
quaint tangle
I am losing it rn
tell you what. im just going to reinstall everything from boot or you can take control of my computer.
tranquil portal
you didnt have add window buttons AGAIN
just click remove on that duplicated item
in the panel prefs> items tab
then click the whisker menu icon (the mouse) and highlight it, then use the up/down arrows or drag it to far left or top of items list
tranquil portal
u see that blue mouse icon in center?
close all the unneeded tasks on the panel, so u dont see so many darn open windows.
tranquil portal
see this post: https://discord.com/channels/628978428019736619/1306486183810961...
then do right click as shown here, to edit
and dont have "Window Buttons" shown TWICE or multiple times in the Panel ITEMS list.
quaint tangle
im going to do a fresh install
this is getting way more complicated than it needs to be
quaint tangle
for me it is. i worked a 10hr shift
csgo and chrome are all ido
i appreciate you getting me to xfce for the file viewer!
tranquil portal
backup chrome bookmarks if need to
quaint tangle
nah its all synced with my phone. no problem. this is just taking longer than it needs to be.
and its completely my fault
tranquil portal
hang on
quaint tangle
i installed the kde environment and then purged it and a ton of othere things from what the ai said
tranquil portal
if ur item list for panel looks like that (pretty much) then that's the normal way
(docklike taskbar, network monitor, are extra things, even workspace switcher)
quaint tangle
nah. i'm just going to do a reinstall and wipe the drive. this is too much work for a system i broke and continue to brea
tranquil portal
alright. i take it you know how to do all that via a USB etc
you can use the built-in image writer tool
quaint tangle
where is that at
tranquil portal
do alt-f3 or click the mouse/whisker icon on panel
type usb
it should result with usb image writer
quaint tangle
found it!
tranquil portal
yeh then u simply get the ISO new
and have that tool flash it.
and do erase disk and install option in the installer
quaint tangle
oh thats way easier.
tranquil portal
yep.. n u got to learn something
plus good to have Timeshift snapshot saves (at least ONE OR TWO) of a known-good working system , makes recovery trivial.
quaint tangle
its saying permission denied when i try to write it
quaint tangle
it was. got dang linux hasa a learning curve
tranquil portal
why was the usb drive read only? (they only get that way if about to fail, or if a user explicitly did something)
u can also use the DISKS app to reformat the usb stick
and even "restore an ISO to..."
quaint tangle
It's a ventoy apparently
tranquil portal
oh if it's ventoy, just slap the darn new ISO on the ventoy partition
nothing more to do
just give it time to finish copying well, and rest half a minute (especially if no usb light is built on it)
quaint tangle
I would already had Linux mint on it apparently
I suppose when I tried to opensuse
tranquil portal
well if u have the iso already on the ventoy stick, then ur good to go
the mint cinnamon ISO, i mean
quaint tangle
Hell yeah! Thank you so much for all your help. This isn't exactly how I planned on spending my day after work
It's an older ISO from like 5 or 6 months ago
tranquil portal
heh np.