09-24-2005, 03:36 AM

How do I uninstall software on the Macs? There are no options as uninstalling, and most apps don't come with uninstaller. Anyone?

Thanks

09-24-2005, 05:00 AM

Originally Posted by AlexN

How do I uninstall software on the Macs? There are no options as uninstalling, and most apps don't come with uninstaller. Anyone?

Thanks

hey

you don't uninstall on a mac - there is no such thing

find the thing you no longer want

then drag it to the trash - thats it :doctor:

regards

09-24-2005, 05:00 AM

Just drag it to the trash!!

09-24-2005, 05:01 AM

Originally Posted by brendan67

hey

you don't uninstall on a mac - there is no such thing

find the thing you no longer want

then drag it to the trash - thats it :doctor:

regards

hey u posted just before me

09-24-2005, 06:50 AM

Won't they install some preference files to the system? For example, I downloaded the Firefox, if I decided I no longer, do I just drag the firefox.app to the trash? It should have some folder for cache, etc.

09-24-2005, 07:17 AM

Originally Posted by AlexN

Won't they install some preference files to the system? For example, I downloaded the Firefox, if I decided I no longer, do I just drag the firefox.app to the trash? It should have some folder for cache, etc.

hey

nope

drag to trash job done

regards :doctor:

09-24-2005, 07:35 AM

Wow, that's too good to be true. hmm...

09-24-2005, 07:44 AM

Empty trash ... Duh. Its gone.
Take it out of trash before you MT Trash if you decide you want to keep it.

09-24-2005, 09:28 AM

Be careful when you speak in absolutes.

There are several threads on this topic in the forums: many apps write preference files and whatnot to the ~user/Library and /Library directories, and deleting the app does not get rid of them. You may want to look through those directories to get rid of things that are put there by various installers-- I got rid of GarageBand, and found almost another 2 GB of related files in one of the Library directories.

09-24-2005, 04:04 PM

Originally Posted by caribiner23

many apps write preference files and whatnot to the ~user/Library and /Library directories, and deleting the app does not get rid of them. You may want to look through those directories to get rid of things that are put there by various installers-- I got rid of GarageBand, and found almost another 2 GB of related files in one of the Library directories.

That's what I'm talking about. So, what is the correct way to uninstall software?

09-24-2005, 05:06 PM

Originally Posted by AlexN

That's what I'm talking about. So, what is the correct way to uninstall software?

99% of the time, simply Trashing the application is enough.

One of the reasons Uninstall is needed under Windows is the "DLL ****" problem, which arises when two programs rely on the same DLL (or some other shared library.) When this happens, if you don't Uninstall one of them properly, the other program won't run either.

Mac apps don't do that. They're usually self-contained: all their libraries are stored inside the application file itself. (A few utilities aren't, but they should include an "Uninstall" or "Remove" script like on Windows.)

So removing a Mac app is as simple as Trashing the application. Afterward, though, some pieces might be left behind. For most apps, these are tiny, and only take up a few KB each. (For example, OmniGraffle's left-behinds would total 15.6 KB. Firfox seems to have left about 20K on my disk, but that could be up to 50MB or more depending on what your cache settings were.)

Badly behaved programs like GarageBand might leave behind gigabytes of documents behind. For that kind of thing, you can run a Spotlight search for the application name ("Garage," for example) but be careful not to accidentally Trash anything that just happens to have Garage in its name.

09-26-2005, 07:53 AM

It is surprising that so many apps are so simple on a Mac!

09-18-2006, 01:42 PM

Just what I wanted to know. I bought myself a mac mini on eBay and am liking it very much. Sounds to simple to be true really.

09-18-2006, 01:48 PM

appzapper

09-18-2006, 01:59 PM

I just type App name or a certain keyword in finder then go and delete the related files. Because like stated earlier in thread, just trashing App icon doesn't get rid of everything. Some third party software does in fact come with a folder and it sometimes contains an uninstaller.