Upon installing Fedora 16 (Fedora-16-Beta) as a guest OS (via VirtualBox), i was greeted with the Fallback mode, turning my excitement to see Gnome3 in its refined new avatar Gnome3.2 into disappointment. Even installing VirtualBox guest additions didnt help.
Its in such scenarios, that i have found fedora-forums to be the best place to learn the causes and rectify them. Thanks to this thread , i realised its a SELinux policy that prevents gnome-shell from auto kick-starting. Follow these steps to enjoy Gnome3.2 experience :
1) Ensure your guest OS is fully updated. Restart once to boot into new kernel.
sudo yum update
2) Install kernel-devel and gcc, if not already present.
sudo yum install kernel-devel gcc
3) In the VirtualBox Guest GUI, Click : Devices > Install Guest Additions. Provide sudo password when prompted and let the install process complete.
4) Now, Modify the SELInux policy for VirtualBox guest additions as below:
restorecon -R – v /opt
(NOTE: single minus sign is used at both places above)
5) And you are ready to use gnome shell after a reboot. To immediately start it, do:
gnome-shell –replace &
(NOTE : its two minus signs before the word replace ..)
- Fedora 16 guest OS with Gnome 3.2 running
Pratyush's Weblog 
Thanks!!!
It worked… and it was so simple…
now I’ll try to “learn” this new shell… I’m already missing the applets and the shortlinks in the desktop.
Thanks again
NOTE; i had to run gnome-shell –replace &, that is 2 dashes
apparently it does not pase properly that is 2 dashes before replace
yup.. you are right.. its two dashes..even in the post its two dashes..
but, i dont know why it shows up as a single large minus sign only !
This process worked for me, but it didn’t say persistent between sessions. If I reboot the machine, it comes back up in fallback mode. If I execute the command in step 5 as root, I will get it back. Reboot. Gone. Step 5. Back. Rinse. Repeat.
Any ideas?
sorry.. correction… It works after reboot, but not after “power down” and “restart”… even more weird!