ubuntu / gnome config / issues / 2025
I had flushed my desktop and was ready to start fresh. Still using Ubuntu for now. It does take a few hacks and tricks to get my system right.
Disable and purge snap
For one, I'm removing snap. The Ubuntu Snap takeover has cost me so many man hours. As mentioned in the linked post, removing it and going with the Linux Mint packages was a great decision. Not once have I regretted not having Snap installed. The post was already future-proof with the availability of Thunderbird in the preferences file. Enabled now:
# Don't use Linux Mint for other packages.
Package: *
Pin: origin "/^(packages.linuxmint.com)/"
Pin-Priority: -1
# Never install snap.
Package: snapd
Pin-Priority: -1
# Pinning does not need to go above 1000 because we do not need to
# downgrade. Ubuntu does not ship with a chromium package.
Package: chromium
Pin: origin "/^(packages.linuxmint.com)/"
Pin-Priority: 600
# Firefox depends on ubuntu-system-adjustments, but you can install
# https://github.com/wdoekes/nosnap-deb/releases/download/v0.1/nosnap_0.1_all.deb
# as replacement.
Package: firefox firefox-locale-*
Pin: origin "/^(packages.linuxmint.com)/"
Pin-Priority: 1000
# Since Ubuntu/Noble we've lost Thunderbird to snap as well.
Package: thunderbird thunderbird-locale-*
Pin: origin "/^(packages.linuxmint.com)/"
Pin-Priority: 1000
GNOME tweaks
Enabling seconds in the top clock and configuring the compose key was already documented in the welcome GNOME shell post:
$ gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface clock-show-seconds true
$ gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.input-sources xkb-options "['compose:ralt']"
(Also the visual bell, but more on that below.)
I had previously worked with custom extensions for three side-by-side windows. But that broke at some point, and I didn't miss it enough to fix it. So that will have to wait.
GNOME super+left/right extra popup
In Ubuntu/Noble a funky plugin feature was introduced that forces you to choose a second window after moving a window to the left or right using Super+Left/Right. This is terribly unergonomic. Disable that:
$ gsettings set org.gnome.shell.extensions.tiling-assistant enable-tiling-popup false
Or, maybe as effective, disable the entire plugin:
$ gnome-extensions list --enabled | grep tiling
tiling-assistant@ubuntu.com
$ gnome-extensions disable tiling-assistant@ubuntu.com
OpenVPN with openvpn-u2f-ask-password
Setting up the openvpn-u2f-ask-password.service to work exactly as I wanted with openvpn running as root, is slightly more complicated than I'd like, but I knew that and copied the settings from the previous install.
gpg-agent precedence
Enabling the gpg-agent was also a bit more complicated. Apart from
adding enable-ssh-support to ~/.gnupg/gpg-agent.conf and configuring
~/.gnupg/sshcontrol I also had to replace
~/.config/environment.d/gpg-agent.conf:
GPG_AGENT_INFO=/run/user/1000/gnupg/S.gpg-agent:0:1
SSH_AUTH_SOCK=/run/user/1000/gnupg/S.gpg-agent.ssh
And above all, disable not one but two ssh-agent alternatives. The GNOME one:
$ (cat /etc/xdg/autostart/gnome-keyring-ssh.desktop; echo Hidden=true) \
>~/.config/autostart/gnome-keyring-ssh.desktop
And the CLI one using
~/.config/systemd/user/ssh-agent.service.d/override.conf:
[Unit]
ConditionPathExists=!/home/walter/.gnupg/sshcontrol
Visual bell causing darkness bug
Lastly, there is the matter of the visual bell bug that causes windows or parts of the screen to go dark when bells are fired during a locked screen.
If you're using:
$ gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.preferences audible-bell false
$ gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.preferences visual-bell true
$ gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.preferences visual-bell-type frame-flash
A visual bell during a lock screen will then cause the window to go dark, as documented in gnome terminal lp#2064716, gnome-shell lp#2113786 and libmutter commit 906920c.
Setting the visual bell to fullscreen-flash instead of frame-flash
makes it noticeably less bad. But it's still a shame that this bug has
persisted for so long.