10 years ago, I bought a laptop that came with linux installed. The
default manager was Gnome. As it was not the annoying touch-screen looking version, I decided to keep it.

Now that the system is 10 years old, Gnome has become a little too resource hungry for it. I have switched it to my favorite manager, IceWM.

I would like to remove Gnome to free up space. I think I know what I need
to do:

(1) replace gdm with another display manager (probably lightdm)
(2) apt remove gnome

However, I want to be sure I am not overlooking anything that might break
when I remove Gnome, i.e. something beyond replacing the display manager
that I might need to consider first?

Thoughts appreciated. Thanks!

Mike


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Re: Removing Gnome
By: Mike Powell to ALL on Sat Oct 25 2025 10:54:45

However, I want to be sure I am not overlooking anything that might break when I remove Gnome, i.e. something beyond replacing the display manager that I might need to consider first?

Hate to be cliche, but have you tried Google?
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Mike Powell wrote to ALL <=-

10 years ago, I bought a laptop that came with linux installed. The default manager was Gnome. As it was not the annoying touch-screen looking version, I decided to keep it.

Now that the system is 10 years old, Gnome has become a little too resource hungry for it. I have switched it to my favorite manager,
IceWM.

I would like to remove Gnome to free up space. I think I know what I
need to do:

(1) replace gdm with another display manager (probably lightdm)
(2) apt remove gnome

However, I want to be sure I am not overlooking anything that might
break when I remove Gnome, i.e. something beyond replacing the display manager that I might need to consider first?

Thoughts appreciated. Thanks!

I've never tried to do such a thing, but I suspect there's quite a bit
more to it than just an 'apt remove' command. I think Gnome is much
more entwined than that.

My thoughts are that you should probably just back up whatever's needed
(maybe just the /home directory), and then reinstall a fresh version of whatever distro you prefer, and restore home/data stuff.



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Mike Powell wrote to ALL <=-

However, I want to be sure I am not overlooking anything that might
break when I remove Gnome, i.e. something beyond replacing the display manager that I might need to consider first?

Remove GNOME first as it has its own display manager and it will be
removed with GNOME. Then install lightdm.

Use "apt remove --purge" to get rid of GNOME fully.

Hope this helps,
Sean

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Mortar wrote to Mike Powell:

Hate to be cliche, but have you tried Google?

Google can be wrong more than it can be right these days. I spend more time filtering out wrong information than finding what I need these days, sadly.

-- Sean



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Gamgee wrote to Mike Powell:

I've never tried to do such a thing, but I suspect there's quite a bit
more to it than just an 'apt remove' command. I think Gnome is much
more entwined than that.

The big problem with removing GNOME is dependency hell and apt will try to remove programs that have nothing to do with GNOME. It's not something I
deal with a lot but it's just another minor detail.

My thoughts are that you should probably just back up whatever's needed (maybe just the /home directory), and then reinstall a fresh version of whatever distro you prefer, and restore home/data stuff.

Nah, that's overkill in this case. You have to be careful with dependency
hell but once that's taken care of, a "apt remove --purge gnome" command
will do the trick.

-- Sean



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Use "apt remove --purge" to get rid of GNOME fully.

I should have said "apt install --purge gnome".

However, apt will remove anything that has the most minor dependency on anything GNOME. aptitude is what I'd use to do a surgical removal of GNOME.

I'm a XFCE fan these dates but MATE brings baack memories of my first
exposure to Linux which was with Red Hat (I'd learn about Slackware a year later).

-- Sean



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Re: Removing Gnome
By: Mortar to Mike Powell on Sat Oct 25 2025 11:52:44

However, I want to be sure I am not overlooking anything that might break when I remove Gnome, i.e. something beyond replacing the display manager that I might need to consider first?

Hate to be cliche, but have you tried Google?

I could have done so, yes, but if we all use Google for everything, why do we bother BBSing? There'd be nothing left to talk about.
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Sean Dennis wrote to Gamgee <=-

I've never tried to do such a thing, but I suspect there's quite a bit
more to it than just an 'apt remove' command. I think Gnome is much
more entwined than that.

The big problem with removing GNOME is dependency hell and apt will try
to remove programs that have nothing to do with GNOME. It's not
something I deal with a lot but it's just another minor detail.

That's what I meant above where I said it was very "entwined" into the
OS.

My thoughts are that you should probably just back up whatever's needed (maybe just the /home directory), and then reinstall a fresh version of whatever distro you prefer, and restore home/data stuff.

Nah, that's overkill in this case. You have to be careful with
dependency hell but once that's taken care of, a "apt remove --purge gnome" command will do the trick.

I'm not understanding something here... How exactly do you "take care
of dependency hell" before using the "apt remove" command? You probably
can't tell exactly what other programs depend on Gnome, and how will you prevent 'apt' from removing them? The devil is in the details...

Again, I would back up my home directory, wipe/reinstall with the
Desktop desired (xfce for me), and be done.



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Gamgee wrote to Sean Dennis <=-

I'm not understanding something here... How exactly do you "take care
of dependency hell" before using the "apt remove" command? You
probably can't tell exactly what other programs depend on Gnome, and
how will you prevent 'apt' from removing them? The devil is in the details...

By not using apt and using aptitude, like I said in my earlier comment. aptitude can show you dependencies and there's workarounds if you're
willing to take the time to look.

The only thing GNOME I use are some of the GNOME games which rely on a
very small amount of GNOME libraries.

Again, I would back up my home directory, wipe/reinstall with the
Desktop desired (xfce for me), and be done.

I have been using Linux in some way or the other since 1998 and not once
have I ever had to do that, even if I've trashed the Linux install.

-- Sean

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Mike Powell wrote to Mortar <=-

I could have done so, yes, but if we all use Google for everything, why
do we bother BBSing? There'd be nothing left to talk about.

You do have a good point and isn't this what we did before Google?

Like I said earlier, with a Web search these days, I spend more time
seperating the wheat from the chaff than finding an answer quickly.

In this case, my answers in this thread are from my direct experience.

-- Sean

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Sean Dennis wrote to Gamgee <=-

I'm not understanding something here... How exactly do you "take care
of dependency hell" before using the "apt remove" command? You
probably can't tell exactly what other programs depend on Gnome, and
how will you prevent 'apt' from removing them? The devil is in the details...

By not using apt and using aptitude, like I said in my earlier comment. aptitude can show you dependencies and there's workarounds if you're willing to take the time to look.

There are workarounds for actual dependencies?

Again, I would back up my home directory, wipe/reinstall with the
Desktop desired (xfce for me), and be done.

I have been using Linux in some way or the other since 1998

So have I.

and not once have I ever had to do that, even if I've trashed the Linux install.

Nobody said it *had* to be done... In this case, IMHO, it's the easiest
way to switch over to a new desktop environment, that's all. There is
often more than one way to do things.



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Re: Re: Removing Gnome
By: Gamgee to Sean Dennis on Sun Oct 26 2025 10:01:35

I'm not understanding something here... How exactly do you "take care
of dependency hell" before using the "apt remove" command? You probably can't tell exactly what other programs depend on Gnome, and how will you prevent 'apt' from removing them? The devil is in the details...

Here I would do it by checking/capturing the list of programs it says it is going to remove and then add any I want to keep back after it is done. If one I want to keep claims it needs to re-install gnome, then I look for an alternative.
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Mike Powell wrote to Gamgee <=-

Re: Re: Removing Gnome
By: Gamgee to Sean Dennis on Sun Oct 26 2025 10:01:35

I'm not understanding something here... How exactly do you "take care
of dependency hell" before using the "apt remove" command? You probably can't tell exactly what other programs depend on Gnome, and how will you prevent 'apt' from removing them? The devil is in the details...

Here I would do it by checking/capturing the list of programs it says
it is going to remove and then add any I want to keep back after it is done. If one I want to keep claims it needs to re-install gnome, then
I look for an alternative.

Okay, gotcha. That wasn't clear before... ;-)



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Re: Removing Gnome
By: Mike Powell to Mortar on Sun Oct 26 2025 08:42:02

I could have done so, yes, but if we all use Google for everything, why do we bother BBSing? There'd be nothing left to talk about.

Hmmm, can't recall the last time I had a discussion with Google.
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