repair of gnome corruption

[Haines Brown <brownh hartford-hwp com>]

A user has a corrupted gnome configuration. It causes very erratic
and unpredicatable mouse behavor, and I can't get a critical gnome
applet to work.

I'm running gnome2 (RH8.0), and gnome2 seems to fight the idea of
doing repairs. The gconf utility allows me to change parameters, but
the function of the numerous XML files in user's home directory is not
at all clear, and they are not conveniently edited by hand (neither is
necessitated merely by the use of XML). 

Is there any documentation on the structure and purpose of the various
directories, subdirectories and XML files in a user's account? 

I'm curious whether my assessment of gnome2's direction of development
is correct. If so, it leaves me with two alternatives: restore from
backup or reinstall gnome. I have questions concerning both. 

If I restore from backup, which gnome directories should I overwrite?
In ~/, there are the .gnome, .gnome-desktop, .gnome2, .gnome2-private,
and .gnome-private directories. What is the distinction of these
directories, and which need to be restored from backup?

If I decide to reinstall gnome, I assume I can remove some gnome files
from user's home account and when X is restarted, they will be
rebuilt. Is this so? Is it possible to have my old configuration
survive this operation by deleting only certain files or folders?

Haines Brown