Ubuntu works for me and my wife and has for years. I pine for the days of Gnome ...

w1ntermute · on Aug 30, 2012

> I pine for the days of Gnome 2 but that's not coming back.

Check out Xubuntu, it's not too different.

nitrogen · on Aug 30, 2012

Linux Mint also has a desktop, Cinnamon, that resembles Gnome 2: http://cinnamon.linuxmint.com/. I haven't tried Cinnamon, but I've used Linux Mint before and will most likely be switching to Mint next time I reinstall Linux.

scoles · on Aug 30, 2012

Irritatingly, Xfce still feels like a step back from Gnome2.

Personally I've come round to Unity and quite like it now.

kintamanimatt · on Aug 30, 2012

You might want to look into MATE[1].

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MATE_%28desktop_environment%29

ralphc · on Sept 1, 2012

Linux Mint 13 with MATE is what you're looking for.

gvb · on Aug 30, 2012

http://askubuntu.com/questions/58172/how-to-revert-to-gnome-...

sudo apt-get install gnome-session-fallback

This is Gnome3 configured to look very much like Gnome2. The primary differences are that "System Settings" (and some other things like printer configuration) moved to the "gear" at the far right of the top bar and you need to use <ALT>-right-mouse to add shortcuts to the top bar.

The <ALT>-right-mouse may only work with Gnome Classic (selected when you log in).