Reset Unity and Compiz Settings in Ubuntu 14.04 [Quick Tip]

If you keep experimenting with your Ubuntu system you might end up with a messed up Unity and Compiz settings. In this quick tip we shall see how to reset Unity and Compiz settings in Ubuntu 14.04. In fact it is all about running a couple of commands.

Reset Unity and Compiz settings in Ubuntu 14.04

Open a terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and use the following command to reset compiz:

dconf reset -f /org/compiz/

When you have reset compiz, restart Unity:

setsid unity

Optionally, if you want to reset Unity to the default launcher icons, try the command below:

unity --reset-icons

Possible troubleshoot:

If you encounter an error like this while resetting the compiz:

error: GDBus.Error:org.gtk.GDBus.UnmappedGError.Quark._g_2dfile_2derror_2dquark.Code17: Cannot open dconf database: invalid gvdb header

The possible reason is that user file has messed up. Make a back up of dconf config and remove the config file:

mv ~/.config/dconf/ ~/.config/dconf.bak

I hope this quick tip helped you to reset Unity and compiz in Ubuntu 14.04. Any questions or suggestions are always welcomed.