Gnome3 for the experienced (FUN Stuff!!!)

[GregE]

Of course it is not all roses, sweetness and light, .desktop files to add menu entries are pathetic compared to Fluxbox's plain text files, and the same goes for it's javascript config files, again Fluxbox is plain text. But at least gnome allows drag and drop onto the dash which is more than the likes of Xfce and Lxde allow you in their menus. For most people drag and drop would be all that is required, but not for power users, and I guess that is what I have become.

Alacarte menu editor works with Gnome3. Just look for the Main Menu application in the list or install Alacarte if it is not there. I have a few home made programs manually installed.

[GeneC]

Alacarte menu editor works with Gnome3. Just look for the Main Menu application in the list or install Alacarte if it is not there. I have a few home made programs manually installed.

Alacarte has been broken in my LMDE-SID Gnome 3 (both in 3.0 and still in 3.2) for some time. I cannot check or uncheck items, nor add/deleted itmes. I tried deleting and reinstalling alacarte to no avail.
On the other hand my LMDE-Testing Gnome 3.0 Alacarte still works fine?

[GregE]

Alacarte menu editor works with Gnome3. Just look for the Main Menu application in the list or install Alacarte if it is not there. I have a few home made programs manually installed.

Alacarte has been broken in my LMDE-SID Gnome 3 (both in 3.0 and still in 3.2) for some time. I cannot check or uncheck items, nor add/deleted itmes. I tried deleting and reinstalling alacarte to no avail.
On the other hand my LMDE-Testing Gnome 3.0 Alacarte still works fine?

Hi Gene, yes the check/uncheck function is broken in mine too, but I can still add new entries and right click -> properties -> modify existing entries which is really all that I need. Plus right click and delete still works as well.

[GregE]

I have spent a lot of time making my Gnome 3.2 look good. Getting just the right theme and font rendering and extensions.

So for those that might want a start point ...

Install Gnome Tweak Tool and it will appear as Advanced Settings in the menu.

Add the Webupd8 repositories. You will need to add the security key manually or just install unverified packages.

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/webupd8team/gnome3/ubuntu oneiric main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/webupd8team/gnome3/ubuntu oneiric main

Install the MGSE extensions and the theme changer, the weather extension, gnome shell classic sys tray . Be careful not to activate too many and crash the shell. If you end up locking yourself out of the shell start in fallback, fire up Synaptic and unistall the extension/s so they cannot load and then go back to the shell.

Then add the Elementary-3.2 theme from here

http://half-left.deviantart.com/gallery ... 6#/d45raik

The zip has versions for both 3.0 and 3.2. Unzip and put in your home folder in the .themes folder. Create the folder if it is not here.

Go to here and grab the deb for mint-z-theme and manually install

http://packages.linuxmint.com/list.php?release=Lisa

Log out and in again or just alt-F2 type in r and press enter.

Then in Advanced settings go to Shell Extensions and turn on

Menu Extension
gnome shell classic sys tray Extension
User Themes Extension
Alternative Status Menu Extension
Bottom Panel Extension
Window List Extension
Weather Indicator Extension

I also use noa11y extension to hide the Universal Access Menu and I also use the Extended Places Status Indicator Extension

Restart the shell and then go back into Advanced settings and this time go to the Theme tab

Cursor Theme Adawaita
Key Binding default
Icon Theme Mint-X
GTK Theme Mint Z
Window Theme Adwaita
Shell Them Elementary-3.2

Enjoy

The only thing non-functional is the places entry in the mint menu - still working on that, thus the other places extension in the list above.

[GregE]

I forgot to mention fonts in general. Installing Gnome Shell in LMDE is still a bit of manual hit and miss. Just installing gnome-shell will not necessarily mean that the cantarell font will be installed and without it you end up with fuzzy text in the menus. Also make sure you have the usual group like Liberation, Ubuntu family, mscorefonts etc.

[viking777]

Alacarte menu editor works with Gnome3. Just look for the Main Menu application in the list or install Alacarte if it is not there. I have a few home made programs manually installed.

Another good tip GregE thanks again!

This is what comes of not having used Gnome seriously for a year or two, you forget so much. Alacarte was already installed and would have saved me an enormous amount of work yesterday if only I had used it rather than creating my own .desktop file from scratch - trying to find the right icon was the biggest pain.

[GeneC]

Greg

Nice tip on adding the Web Upd8 repo. Looks like most of the new Mint (msge) extensions are there as well.

http://www.webupd8.org/search/label/gno ... results=10

[GregE]

There is now a Gnome Shell Extensions package in Debian Experimental that packages a few extensions. It is incompatible with the Webupd8 extensions and no where as extensive yet. It does not contain the MGSE extensions.

I would avoid it for the moment. In the future we can probably dump Webupd8, but not yet.

[viking777]

Is it just me or is anybody else having problems with keyboard shortcuts on gnome-shell?

Their operation seems to me to be completely random. Sometimes they are all perfectly Ok, sometimes they only work with the window selected to 'activities' view, and sometimes they don't work at all. I am not only talking about custom shortcuts either, even the built-ins like Alt/F2 behave in the same random manner.

As an example, I just tried out 3 keyboard shortcuts, 2 custom and one built in. In 'desktop' view none of them worked, in 'activities' view only the built in worked, but since I opened a browser window to type this post, all 3 of them now work

[GregE]

Is it just me or is anybody else having problems with keyboard shortcuts on gnome-shell?

Their operation seems to me to be completely random. Sometimes they are all perfectly Ok, sometimes they only work with the window selected to 'activities' view, and sometimes they don't work at all. I am not only talking about custom shortcuts either, even the built-ins like Alt/F2 behave in the same random manner.

As an example, I just tried out 3 keyboard shortcuts, 2 custom and one built in. In 'desktop' view none of them worked, in 'activities' view only the built in worked, but since I opened a browser window to type this post, all 3 of them now work

I have had that problem over the journey with both 3.0 and 3.2. I always used the 32bit versions until last weekend. Alt-F2 would be intermittent and i also use the Euro symbol and that keystroke would also go missing. Opening the keyboard config app, in system settings, then closing it would sometimes make the keys work again.

Last weekend I reinstalled from scratch and went 64bit . I had been stuck in 32bit because of my Kobo book reader but now have moved my books to a Toshiba Thrive. Anyway my keys have been absolutely reliable since the new install. Whether it was going 64bit versions or just removing six months of accumulated cruft I do not know.

But it is a real issue. Maybe it just needs newer versions to come through or it is a problem with something left over from Gnome 2. I cannot answer that one.

[whirly]

i get a funny keyboard too
and an indicator grey with a circle and line thru it (no parking? mind the gap?)
pops in and out randomly
perhaps indicating a keyboard disconnect, as i use touchpad a lot, and got an onscreen keyboard in my universal access menu---2 reasons to cut keyboard
so you're not alone
but i'm no help
logging out helps but if it all freezes, i have had to resort to using the off button

[GregE]

Just in case anyone cares .....

I have a Google Plus account and have added Debian to my Circles. Thus I get a stream of useful announcements like "Gnome 3 is now in testing" etc. Nothing you cannot get from the Debian web pages, but if you have a Google Plus account it is a useful stream.

Cheers

[viking777]

Thanks for the replies at least I know it is not just me.

I don't think it is anything to do with 64bit vs 32bit because my system is already 64bit.

[alr11389]

Hi, I want to use the fallback mode but I didn't see that option on System information -> Graphics. Any suggestion?

[autocrosser]

Hi, I want to use the fallback mode but I didn't see that option on System information -> Graphics. Any suggestion?

The "fallback" mode is at the login screen--take a look at the options under session.

[alr11389]

Oh thanks! in newest versions of gnome i remember that it was on System Information -> Graphics -> Force fallback mode. I will upgrade my desktop pc to gnome3 now

[GregE]

Catalyst 11.11 is out.

The bad news is that it is not any better. Gnome Shell will run and it is usable, but you will be constantly plagued by dialog box corruption.

Try again with 11.12

[viking777]

The icon sizes in the gnome-shell applications menu are ridiculously large. This is how to reduce the size:

Edit system files directly (make a backup first) or copy theme files to your local folder and edit these files. For the default theme, edit /usr/share/gnome-shell/theme/gnome-shell.css

For user themes, edit /usr/share/themes/<UserTheme>/gnome-shell/gnome-shell.css

Edit gnome-shell.css and replace the following values. Afterward, restart the GNOME shell.

gnome-shell.css

Code: Select all

 .icon-grid {
     spacing: 18px;
     -shell-grid-item-size: 82px;
 }
 
 .icon-grid .overview-icon {
     icon-size: 48px;
 }

Courtesy or ArchLinux wiki.

Whilst I am on the subject of the gnome-shell menu, the best way I have found so far of removing unwanted entries from the applications menu is to rename the entries in /usr/share/applications. For example you could rename mahjongg.desktop to mahjongg.desktop.unwanted. That way if you ever decide to teach yourself mahjongg in the future the file will only need to be renamed back again and you are good to go

[viking777]

Remove Accessibility Icon from top panel

Go to this address and download the version appropriate to your gnome-shell.

http://martin-weusten.de/projects/gnome ... lity-icon/

Unpack it to ~/.local/share/gnome-shell/extensions.

Then restart the shell with Alt/F2 r.

[viking777]

Force Nautilus to use Location bar instead of Path bar

This setting has moved from gconf-editor to dconf-editor, so open the latter, navigate to org/gnome/nautilus/preferences and tick the entry "always_use_location_entry" in the right hand pane.