Help i got kde plasma on zorin how do i destroy it

General Help
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1

after a while of customizing and enjoying the desktop enviroment i got from

sudo apt install kde-plasma-desktop

i read a few reddit posts about getting it on zorin and they abesolutely forbid i am i cooked?
i dont want to have to reinstall zorin.
how can i completely get rid of kde? SHOULD i get rid of kde? (i LOVE it so that influences my decision a bit), CAN i get rid of kde?
i chose sddm as default display manager.
probably the best thing i should do is like somehow switch back to the gnome i was on before, then delete plasma. how can i do that safely?

2

Yes. Whether you do or not - yes. You can, easily and safely.

But it is true that installing Plasma... does things. Annoying things.
It is Qt, and it tries to adapt itself to your many GTK apps, so it creates configurations for this. That will bother and annoy you if you remove Plasma.
To remove it, just run the reverse of installing it.

sudo apt remove --purge kde-plasma-desktop

Once that is done, you now must clean up.
The D.E. also installs Breeze Icons and themes - and these are actually tied into your GTK, so it changes how your applications look.

sudo apt remove --purge breeze-icon-theme breeze-gtk-theme dolphin konsole kate kde-cli-tools kde-runtime kde-baseapps kde-style-* kcalc ark kio kwalletmanager

etc. You may need to

dpkg -l | grep kde

dpkg -l | grep plasma

to find them all.
Remove the leftover orphans:
~/.kde
~/.kde4
~/.local/share/kxmlgui5
~/.local/share/plasma*
~/.config/plasma*
~/.config/k* # e.g., kglobalshortcutsrc, kdeglobals
~/.cache/plasma*

Remove sessions:

sudo rm /usr/share/xsessions/plasma.desktop

sudo rm /usr/share/wayland-sessions/plasma.desktop

If you want GDM# back (for some reason) you can run

sudo dpkg-reconfigure gdm3

Follow the prompts. If needed, you can run:

sudo systemctl enable gdm3

sudo systemctl disable sddm

How do I know?
I just did this last week trying to get over my mental block against KDE.

I was unsuccessful.

Again.

2 Likes
3

ok i did allat but there is still theme stuff leftover like some light theme i cant disable destroying my eyes back on gnome ahhhh

4

I feel your pain.

Did these provide any clues?
I know breeze does it. And there are those configs. For example, the settings.ini in ~/.config/gtk3-0 needs to go.

1 Like
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dpkg -l | grep kde
ii debconf-kde-data 1.1.0-1 all Debconf KDE data files
ii debconf-kde-helper 1.1.0-1 amd64 Debconf KDE GUI frontend tool
rc kde-config-gtk-style:amd64 4:5.24.4-0ubuntu1 amd64 KDE configuration module for GTK+ 2.x and GTK+ 3.x styles selection
rc kded5 5.92.0-0ubuntu1 amd64 Extensible daemon for providing session services
rc kdepim-addons 21.12.3-0ubuntu1 amd64 Addons for KDE PIM applications
rc kdepim-runtime 4:21.12.3-0ubuntu1 amd64 runtime components for Akonadi KDE
ii libblockdev-crypto2:amd64 2.26-1ubuntu0.1 amd64 Crypto plugin for libblockdev
ii libblockdev-fs2:amd64 2.26-1ubuntu0.1 amd64 file system plugin for libblockdev
ii libblockdev-loop2:amd64 2.26-1ubuntu0.1 amd64 Loop device plugin for libblockdev
ii libblockdev-part-err2:amd64 2.26-1ubuntu0.1 amd64 Partition error utility functions for libblockdev
ii libblockdev-part2:amd64 2.26-1ubuntu0.1 amd64 Partitioning plugin for libblockdev
ii libblockdev-swap2:amd64 2.26-1ubuntu0.1 amd64 Swap plugin for libblockdev
ii libblockdev-utils2:amd64 2.26-1ubuntu0.1 amd64 Utility functions for libblockdev
ii libblockdev2:amd64 2.26-1ubuntu0.1 amd64 Library for manipulating block devices
ii libdebconf-kde1:amd64 1.1.0-1 amd64 Debconf KDE GUI library
rc libkf5kdelibs4support-data 5.92.0-0ubuntu1 all Porting aid from KDELibs4.
rc libkf5ksieve-data 4:21.12.3-0ubuntu1 all Sieve mail filtering language support for kdepim, data files
rc libkf5libkdepim-data 4:21.12.3-0ubuntu1 all KDE PIM library - data files
rc libkf5su-data 5.92.0-0ubuntu1.1 all translation files for kdesu
ii polkit-kde-agent-1 4:5.24.4-0ubuntu1 amd64 KDE dialogs for PolicyKit
~$ dpkg -l | grep plasma
rc plasma-discover-common 5.24.7-0ubuntu0.1 all Discover software manager suite (common data files)
rc plasma-widgets-addons 4:5.24.7-0ubuntu0.1 amd64 additional widgets for Plasma

i know whatever these are it means alot of plasma is still there

6

sudo apt remove --purge kde-config-gtk-style kded5 kdepim-addons kdepim-runtime libkf5kdelibs4support-data libkf5ksieve-data libkf5libkdepim-data libkf5su-data polkit-kde-agent-1 plasma-discover-common plasma-widgets-addons

I did not include Libblock, because that is a broader package that Zorin OS uses. KDE does use it, too which is probably why it came up in the list.

For these residual configs (quoting a section as an example. rc is residual configuration whereas ii is Installed):

sudo apt purge $(dpkg -l | awk '/^rc/ {print $2}' | grep -E 'kde|plasma|kf5|kded|kdepim|polkit-kde')

2 Likes
7

i don't think its perfect but i followed the commands and did sudo apt autoremove and then restarted and everything seems normal again.
i salute to you once more for what you have done :saluting_face:
and i feel that this discussion will help many others that fell for the plasma trap too!

3 Likes
8

Ah... but you enjoyed it...

1 Like
9

yeah i did but i would rather not have to worry about the long term issues :pensive_face:

10

Oh yes, installing a different desktop environment is done so quickly...But in my experience it really messes up the system. If you don't really need it or when you are a Linux newbie - it's better not to install it quickly just to look at it. The remove is difficult. Better take a distro that offers the other desktopenvironment by default.

11

might switch from zorin sometime. i saw my brother trying mint and it looked much more solid

but whatever distro i might end up using sometime now its gotta be a kde plasma distro (thinking about kubuntu)

1 Like
12

I am unaware of long term issues, other than there being any long term annoyances. But you could dual boot a KDE distro like Kubuntu or Neon.

I have only ever had Plasma really throw a wrench into the works.

But I have installed (On Zorin OS, even)

  • Enlightenment
  • Mate
  • Cinnamon
  • LXDE and LXDE-GTK3
  • XFCE (on GNome)
  • Budgie

Without any problems. Occasionally, there was some small config issue, easily fixed.
Plasma and LXQt, though... They work some magic.

3 Likes
13

Maybe the lighter DEs don't mess the system as much as gnome and kde.

14

I have never installed GNome alongside another D.E. so you make a valid point.

15

Installing Xfce4 and Zorin lite desktop on Zorin core was no problem, but installing gnome (Zorin desktop) on Zorin lite caused some problems on my system.

16

Instead of Kubuntu, try CachyOS. It is based Arch with KDE.

1 Like
17

i replaced zorin with kde neon