However, you can always change those to suit your needs. In fact, the first thing you will notice when you log in to your gnome desktop session is that it has some default settings for you, and a few pre-defined commands for the user. If you install gedit, it will set up all the necessary features you need to get the most from it. The gedit configuration can be changed using the System Settings Utility which is available from the Control Panel section of the system menu. The purpose of gedit is very simple: it is a text editor that is used to edit most kinds of files and documents in a terminal-based interface. Gedit is the multi-text editor of the gnome desktop environment.