Ubuntu is the most popular Linux distribution where GNOME is another popular Linux Desktop Environment. Ubuntu has switched to the Unity desktop a long time ago and recently it is returned into the GNOME desktop. In this tutorial, we will install GNOME Desktop into the Ubuntu distribution.
Install Complete Gnome Desktop
Gnome Desktop Environment consists of multiple components. These components are gnome-shell , gdm3 etc. But Ubuntu provides the ubuntu-gnome-desktop package as a complete solution that will install all required components as a single command or package group. We will install it with apt command but apt-get can be also used with the same command. We will also provide the sudo which is used to provide administrative privileges.
$ sudo apt install ubuntu-gnome-desktop
Install via Tasksel
Tasksel is command-line based GUI tool to manage packages and package groups. We can install GNOME from the tasksel like below. We will provide the root privileges with sudo command. Tasksel will list currently available packages that can be installed or already installed. We can install the GNOME desktop with the name of Ubuntu Desktop like below.
$ sudo tasksel
Change Default Desktop Environment To GNOME
We can change the default desktop to the GNOME from the login screen like below. The screen may be different for different cases but in general, the selected user desktop environment can be changed from a configuration button into the GNOME like below. Then we can sign in by providing the user password.
We will see the main desktop like below.
Check GNOME Version
We can check the GNOME version in different ways. We can check the GNOME version via the command line with the gnome-shell command with the --version option.
$ gnome-shell --versionOR via Settings->Details.
