Why was my KDE desktop switched with the Gnome one and how can I change it back?

Question

To clarify, I am still using KDE (Kubuntu specifically) but I also have Gnome installed. However, when I log in, my plasma desktop shows up for a few seconds, but then switches to the Gnome desktop. The plasma widgets disappear, the icons change, and the right-click menu is GTK themed and has the Gnome options rather than the KDE ones.

I've been messing with a lot of options over the past few days, but I think that this probably happened because I removed a lot of native apps (Amarok, Dragon Player, Movie Player, KMail, KTorrent, Transmission, and maybe a couple more).

Any ideas on how I can revert back to my KDE plasma desktop without a complete reinstallation?

Answer 1

First create (or edit) your ~/.xinitrc file ($ represents your prompt, don't type it):

$gedit ~/.xinitrc

add this to it:

#!/usr/bin/env bash
exec startkde

make the file executable:

$chmod +x ~/.xinitrc

Let's link it to ~/.xsession so it's read by GDM on startup:

ln -s ~/.xinitrc ~/.xsession

Reboot.

Now enter your username and click sessions. Select default session and it should load KDE.