I am currently running Ubuntu 10.10.

I want all the benefits of an upgrade without any of the disadvantages (i.e. Unity).

After the upgrade I don't want to be surprised and find that my gnome-panel has been replaced with something else, like what happened last time.

Is there a way to do this?

Is there a way to backup my current configuration, so that if something magical like that happens, I can do a roll back?

you need to take an image of your partitions using ghost4linux or redo backup and recovery
http://sourceforge.net/projects/g4l/
http://sourceforge.net/projects/redo...urce=directory

if you are linux expert use ghost4linux
if u are a newbie use redo backup
good luck

Before you upgrade get your system exactly how you want it (meaning the packages you have installed). Once you are happy open a terminal and type
Make sure the file is in your /home

Now do your upgrade and then type this in a terminal
This will clear the newly setup list in apt of what packages are currently installed on your system.
Now type this into your terminal
Now all you should need to do it
This will uninstall packages you don't want and install new versions of the packages you do want. All your previous user settings should, if you have a separate /home partition, be in your /home as .hidden files (the . indicates the file/folder is hidden)

The relevant information is in the man pages and also in various places on the net.

Gnome panel as you are used to will not be available in 11.10. That is not even Ubuntus fault. Gnome3, on which 11.10 is based does not support such a thing.

The closest thing you could do is, if you are installed on 2 partitions, get the netboot install and install the base package and reboot and install from the command line when you first boot.

Install whatever the package is called in Ubuntu repos that supplies the gnome desktop (not the Ubuntu desktop). This will allow you to install gnome-fallback. This package will not be available for many versions either. It is supplied now by the Gnome folks for peopld who do not have the hardware for Gnome Shell.

You will be able to boot to it by selecting it at the loging screen in the "session" menu there.

If you really want a panel type DE I would look very seriously at Xfce. I do not particularly like the version in Xubuntu 11.10 but the one coming up in 12.04 (I have Xubuntu 12.04-testing installed) is very nice. 11.10 uses 4.6 and the panel is not quite as customizable as it is in 4.8 which comes in with 12.04.

Debian testing (Wheezy) has been using 4.8 for a longer time. That is the OS I am on now and use most of the time. As a long time Gnome user I can tell you that I would not go back if the reenabled the old Gnome2 panel DE.

Once again it would be a safe and easy thing to just install Xubuntu 11.04 if you are intalled on 2 partitions. Just don't format the /home partition. Backing up is still a great idea (I do) but I have done this for years and never needed to use the back up files. There is always that chance though.

This is correct Gnome 3 doesn't have Gnome-panel like Gnome 2x did. Good catch there Widget, I didn't think of that. Gnome 3 has gnome-session-fallback (the name of the relevant package) and this uses gnome-panel from Gnome 3 plus Metacity from Gnome 2x. So to get the look, not necessarily the full feel, of Gnome panels you will also have to install gnome-session-fallback in addition to what I put in my previous post.

I should probably get back into Ubuntu a bit more, problem is I'm having so much fun with modifying Debian

I really don't think that radical down grading of the OS's available on your box is a good idea.

I do admit to having Xubuntu 12.04-testing on here but have come to realize it is not a particularly good idea. Except to find out why it is so much bigger than Debian with Xfce. Xubuntu is riddled with Gnome packages. No wonder it is practically as heavy as Ubuntu.

You must upgrade in sequence. That is, you must upgrade from 10.10 to 11.04, and then to 11.10. You can not upgrade directly from 10.10 to 11.10 and skip 11.04.
Or even better yet, just do a clean install (not a dist-upgrade) of Lubuntu 11.10. Lubuntu is very fast and light and uses the LXDE (sans Unity, sans Gnome 3 shell) desktop.