converting Ubuntu 12.10 to Kubuntu 13.10

[Tom_ZeCat]

I'm here in an old Lenovo laptop that was given to my family for free. It was a Windows XP machine trashed by viruses that the people got sick of fooling with, so they gave it to us and bought a new machine. I originally put Kubuntu 13.10 on it, which ran great except that the wireless card would not work. I then tried with Lubuntu. No luck. I was using instructions for Ubuntu 12.10 because it's all I could find. So that's why Ubuntu 12.10 is on this thing, even though I don't like the interface of this distro. The idea was to troubleshoot the wireless networking problems the the same distro that the instructions I found online were for.

I was successful. This thing is finally connected wirelessly after much troubleshooting. I'm happy, but this thing still has the yucky Ubuntu interface that I don't like and it isn't the latest version.

Next step: Get this OS up to date and convert it into Kubuntu, the interface that is so much easier to work with than regular Ubuntu IMO. I did find this link about it:

http://askubuntu.com/questions/30628...form-of-ubuntu

It suggests doing this at the command line:

sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop

Is that it? Is it that simple to convert Ubuntu into Kubuntu? Is there anything else I need to know about or do? Also, should I run the upgrade command in Ubuntu first, bringing it up to Ubuntu 13.10 first? Or should I Kubuntuize first and then run an upgrade?

I appreciate any suggestions. Thanks.

[kubicle]

Is that it? Is it that simple to convert Ubuntu into Kubuntu?

Yes and no. Installing the kubuntu-desktop metapackage will install everything a default kubuntu install would. After installing you can choose to log into kubuntu-desktop from the login screen. However, you'd still have all the ubuntu parts installed also (not really a problem if you don't mind having two DEs, and for the most part two programs for each task installed and taking disk space). There are instructions to remove the ubuntu specific parts available online, for example: http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/purekubuntu

As far as upgrading goes, upgrading non-LTS releases by skipping release versions (in this case, upgrading from 12.10 to 13.10 and skipping 13.04) isn't supported. It may work, but there might be issues with the upgrade (these are usually solvable, but may need intermediate level expertise).

[Tom_ZeCat]

Yes and no. Installing the kubuntu-desktop metapackage will install everything a default kubuntu install would. After installing you can choose to log into kubuntu-desktop from the login screen. However, you'd still have all the ubuntu parts installed also (not really a problem if you don't mind having two DEs, and for the most part two programs for each task installed and taking disk space). There are instructions to remove the ubuntu specific parts available online, for example: http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/purekubuntu

As far as upgrading goes, upgrading non-LTS releases by skipping release versions (in this case, upgrading from 12.10 to 13.10 and skipping 13.04) isn't supported. It may work, but there might be issues with the upgrade (these are usually solvable, but may need intermediate level expertise).

I see. What if I simply went from 12.10 to 13.04 and then went from 13.04 to 13.10?

Thanx for the hep.

[kubicle]

I see. What if I simply went from 12.10 to 13.04 and then went from 13.04 to 13.10?

That should be fine (at least it is supported ).

[Tom_ZeCat]

Uhg. I'm annoyed with this thing. I keep cut and pasting that long remove ubuntu command from psychocats.net and it doesn't work. It does a few things and then says something to the effect of "could not find package" and it quits.

At the opening screen Ubuntu is set as the default. Is there some way to just set Kubuntu as the default? I'll do that and just live with having the extra Ubuntu distro on there. It will be my roommate using this computer and he's very much a novice. He'll be better off with Kubuntu which is easier. I just don't want him accidentally logging into Ubuntu and wondering WTF.

[Tom_ZeCat]

An update: I think I've figured this out. The terminal doesn't seem to like that gigantic command pasted into it. I've been breaking it up into smaller commands with "sudo apt-get remove". So far so good. Will let you know how it goes.

[woodsmoke]

I have installed KDE on top of plain Ubu on my old Toshiba Lappy, with a 80 gig hd and had both DEs and did not see a problem except for lost of space.

woodsmoke

[mastablasta]

An update: I think I've figured this out. The terminal doesn't seem to like that gigantic command pasted into it. I've been breaking it up into smaller commands with "sudo apt-get remove". So far so good. Will let you know how it goes.

you need to use correct instructions/set of commands. in your case for example you use the one for 12.10 and then install kubuntu desktop meta package.

[Tom_ZeCat]

you need to use correct instructions/set of commands. in your case for example you use the one for 12.10 and then install kubuntu desktop meta package.

It's a wash at this point. It ended up being simpler to just do a full wipe and install of Kubuntu 13.10 from an install disk. There wasn't any data or software installs that I needed to preserve. Thanks, though.