[SOLVED]How to change gnome 2 to xfce 4.10.

[caaarlos]

Hello, how can I change my system to xfce 4.10? I'm using gnome 2, and I want to remove all gnome 2 packages and only use xfce 4.

[The Doctor]

Be aware that a certain number of libraries will come along for the ride.

First you will want to adjust your profile and use flags. use eselect profile to set the desktop one instead of gnome. You may also want to set -gnome in your make.conf USE variable. Next, you probably want to have X while you work, so install xfce. There are documents with advice both official and here. There are unofficial ones as well if you feel the need to find them.

Once you have xfce installed and are logged in, its time to start removing the old gnome packages. To do this, it is helpful to know what is installed. I would recommend you consult but do not edit /var/lib/portage/world. less is an excellent application for this purpose. Alternatively, you can go by your memory of what you have installed.

List all gnome related applications you want to remove, including the gnome meta package. You should also note all dependencies that may have polluted your
world file, such as perl-hearers or something. Then there are two ways to go. The first way is to force portage to remove the packages with emerge -C. I would advise against this as it can have unexpected results, ie break things. Instead, I would use the --deselect and deselect all the gnome packages and any wayward dependencies you found. This removes them from the world file. Next, use run emerge -ac to depclean them. Check the list to make sure nothing important is being removed.

A round of emerge -auvND world followed by emerge -ac and revdep-rebuild is called for to clean up. You can use equery from the gentoolkit to identify what packages depend on something if you think it should be removed but isn't. Its well documented.
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First things first, but not necessarily in that order.

Apologies if I take a while to respond. I'm currently working on the dematerialization circuit for my blue box.

[caaarlos]

Thanks The Doctor, its really worked!