A while ago, we shared an article about Resetter - an application which is used to reset Ubuntu to factory defaults within a few minutes. Using Resetter, anyone can easily reset their Ubuntu system to the state when it is installed in the first time. Today, I stumbled upon a similar thing. No, It's not an application, but a one-liner command to reset your Linux desktop settings, tweaks and customization to default state.
Reset Linux desktop to default settings
This command will reset Ubuntu Unity, Gnome and MATE desktops to the default state. I tested this command on both my Arch Linux MATE desktop and Ubuntu 16.04 Unity desktop. It worked on both systems. I hope it will work on other Linux desktops as well. I don't have any Linux desktop with GNOME as of writing this, so I couldn't confirm it. But, I believe it will work on Gnome DE as well.
A word of caution: Please be mindful that this command will reset all customization and tweaks you made in your system, including the pinned applications in the Unity launcher or Dock, desktop panel applets, desktop indicators, your system fonts, GTK themes, icon themes, monitor resolution, keyboard shortcuts, window button placement, menu and launcher behaviour etc.
Good thing is it will only reset the desktop settings. It won't affect the other applications that doesn't use dconf. Also, it won't delete your personal data.
Now, let us do this. To reset Ubuntu Unity or any other Linux desktop with GNOME/MATE DEs to its default settings, run:
dconf reset -f /
This is my Ubuntu 16.04 LTS desktop before running the above command:
As you see, I have changed the desktop wallpaper and themes.
This is how my Ubuntu 16.04 LTS desktop turned out after running that command:
Look? Now, my Ubuntu desktop has gone to the factory settings.
For more details, refer "dconf" command's man pages.
$ man dconf
I personally prefer to use "Resetter" over "dconf" command for this purpose. Because, Resetter provides more options to the users. The users can decide which applications to remove, which applications to keep, whether to keep existing user account or create a new user and many. If you're too lazy to install Resetter, you can just use this "dconf" command to reset your Linux system to default settings within a few minutes.
Reference:
21 comments
It’s working. Thanks.
This worked for me after I borked my panels all up in Ubuntu Mate 17.10. Thanks for the help.
result :
root@Jungle8:/home/matt# dconf reset -f /
error: The connection is closed
…
Worked for me in Mint Mate 18.3. Much obliged!
Shouldn’t this be titled “Reset your Ubuntu desktop” rather than “Linux Desktop”?
thanks for this. accidetally messed up my windows whilst tweaking with a mac style appearance. this command got me back to the default zorin appearance.
Did not work for me with Debian Wheezy. 🙁
works for me Linux 19 mate Tara I’ve spent almost a week trying to get panels back to a site I can read the bottom of the page. Thank You
worked for me on linux mint 17.3 cinnamon
Does not work in Ubuntu 16.04 LTS
Worked perfectly Linux Mint 19.1. Thanks for the tip!
Thanks I screwed up my linux mint mate 19 tessa desktop really bad.
No panel items only a desktop background.
This command really helped me!
Works great on Solus4 Mate!
I messed with the qt5 settings and made everything so big I couldn’t get back to the part I needed to fix it. This took care of it. Thank you.
The following works Ubuntu with Mate 1.12.1 . cd to ~/.config/dconf then mv user to user.bak logout and log in again. This should reset the desktop and recreate the file user.
You friggin’ RAWK! I just did an install of Ubuntu Mate 19.04 on a Microsoft Surface 3 and everything was going well until I tried to use Mate Tweak to change to ‘Redmond.’ I’ve been pulling my hair out trying to at least get to the control center. This worked perfect! Thanks again!
Fuuuck!! this is what I wanted!
I messed on my desktop settings with Komorebi and I couldnt find a way to came back neither resetter helped me.
Thanks Man!
Worked great. THAAAANK you! Minimized applications now shrink to an icon in the panel once again. Been making me crazy. Don’t know what I did to mess that up and didn’t know how to fix it. My life is now complete – Mint 18.3 Mate
my linux was error before,,all apps crash after using new icon,,but i found this post and it normal again,,
thanks v much 🙂
Thanks!
This fix ( dconf reset -f / ) also works on Cinnamon / Ubuntu 20.1 February 2021 You just have to edit your preferences again.
Thanks very much