31

I am using Ubuntu 15.10. I accidentally changed the size of the interface to maximum. Now my folders and windows are too large and don't fully fit the screen so I cannot revert the effect. Is there any way to reset the display settings to default so this can revert to normal?

Zanna
  • 69,223
  • 56
  • 216
  • 327
alexanast
  • 321
  • 1
  • 3
  • 4

4 Answers4

50

Removing ~/.config/monitors.xml should do it:

  • Open a terminal window by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T
  • type rm ~/.config/monitors.xml and press Enter
  • immediately log out and back in. It should be reverted now

Alternatively

If you know what resolution your screen supports (e.g. 1440x900), you can run the command:

xrandr -s 1440x900

to at least temporarily set a workable solution, then subsequently change settings from GUI.

Community
  • 1
Jacob Vlijm
  • 82,471
  • 12
  • 195
  • 299
  • 6
    it did not work. – alexanast Mar 23 '16 at 14:07
  • uhd. It was the highest in the settings and it is already set at that resoloution. i think 3840x2160 – alexanast Mar 23 '16 at 14:12
  • Hi @alexanast just (re) tested it. Did you forget to log out/in? it works really. Local monitor settings are stored in `~/.config/monitors.xml`. There is no way these settings are remembered if you remove the file and immediately log out, unless you must have done something exotic. – Jacob Vlijm Mar 23 '16 at 14:24
  • login screen fixed but desktop enviroment didnt. Restarting to check. edit It did not. – alexanast Mar 23 '16 at 14:34
  • @alexanast curious to what you did to change the settings? – Jacob Vlijm Mar 23 '16 at 14:55
  • well i guess i will mark this as correct since it should work. I fixed it through settings by going in blind using tab so no problem. Thanks for the soloution and you patience – alexanast Mar 23 '16 at 14:56
  • also works if you know the resolution you want, edit the monitors.xml file and set the resolution to your desired value – bakoyaro Mar 15 '18 at 03:34
  • A quick and effective way to restart the GUI (both Xorg and Wayland) in case of problems like this is to use the `Ctrl-Alt-Backspace` shortcut. You could remove `monitors.xml` and restart GUI right away using this shortcut. Unfortunately is disabled by default. You need to run `sudo dpkg-reconfigure keyboard-configuration` and answer yes when prompted to enable this shortcut. – gerlos Feb 07 '19 at 15:59
  • I'm using Lubuntu 18.04 and ~/.config/monitors.xml does not exist on my machine, what could be some possible alternate locations for this file? – tommy61157 May 30 '19 at 11:37
  • I had to restart the computer in order to have it work, but basically removing the `monitors.xml` did the trick. – Kosta Jun 12 '19 at 12:00
  • if you ended up in the recovery mode with root access the file will not be under `~`, but under `/home/yourusername` instead – Jules Colle May 15 '20 at 18:53
  • I was having some bizarre dual monitor behaviors and this removal fixed it, many thanks! – Henrique Bruno Oct 03 '21 at 22:19
7

I had a similar problem to you but I found the solution here How to scale title bars and menu in Ubuntu 14.04 with the terminal only

dconf reset /com/ubuntu/user-interface/scale-factor

This changes the "scale for menu and title bars" to default.

Community
  • 1
Slaughterfish
  • 71
  • 1
  • 3
3

Just to add to this, since this is the first thread that appeared for me: My solution to reset the display was to use:

xrandr --listactivemonitors
Joanna Marie
  • 132
  • 6
-1

Just rebooting can fix it, but it depends on what caused the change.

Before you fiddle with settings, reboot and see if the resolution reverts to the correct setting.

Moondoggy
  • 649
  • 6
  • 6