Conflicted extensions

Hello,
I was following some instructions to apply a theme, which included enabling gnome extensions via the browser
obviously this then proceded to break various features - Topbar disappeared, Arc menu stopped working, Dash-to-dock disapeared, Importing settings didn’t work, …
I stepped away for a few days, and when I came back thought of Timeshifting to restore to before I started meddling with adding extensions, but I guess I missed the window of time or it just didn’t restore those elements

so a little more research and I’ve now realised that installing what I now realise were duplicates of extensions broke everything, but now I’m stuck with makeshift haphazard fixes and I still can’t import settings into extensions (so I can’t apply the nice themed look I was hoping to achieve which got me into this mess)
If I uninstall the duplicated extensions via the browser (eg Dash to Panel), they disapear completely, and they don’t show up in the manually installed extensions in Layout Settings tweaks

so after that long background intro … my question is:
I’d like to know if there’s a way to reset gnome settings and extensions to the defaults?

ideally reset gnome tweaks, layout settings, extensions, Arc Menu, Dash to Panel, Dash to Dock, top panel, …

My guess is

Am asking this wonderful community if I’m on the right track, if there’s a list of default extensions, or if there’s a simpler was to reset gnome to original settings

Hope that makes sense & many thanks

Usually copying the user skeleton files will restore defaults. The defaults are stored in /etc/skel (there is hidden folders aka dot-folders) but I haven’t used Gnome for years to I am out of practice :slight_smile: (I started with Gnome but we had to part and went separate ways years ago).

Extensions has a high probability of breaking Gnome shell - most extensions from the repo should should work but extensions for Gnome 3.36 most likely don’t work due to the huge changes implemented upstream with Gnome 40.

The manually installed ones are in your home directory (if installed through the browser extension) and are in the folder /home/[user name]/.local/share/gnome-shell/extensions/

The system extensions are /usr/share/gnome-shell/extensions/ and they are managed by a package manager.

My guess is that removing the duplicate extensions in the home folder could have a positive effect.

https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/GnomeShell/Extensions#Extensions

Thanks both @linux-aarhus and @Hanzel

unfortunately neither of those worked - still left with a glitchy desktop experience

going back to KDE

…which was caused by you. Switching to another DE isn’t going to make any difference if you continue the same practices. On the bright side, making mistakes help one learn. :wink:

Totally my fault, and learning experience

I had a good time with gnome, it was always going to be an experiment, it just confirmed, for me, I like KDE better

And set Timeshift for more backups

And experiment in a VM first

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I won’t hold it against you. :stuck_out_tongue:

Good call. :+1:

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