uninstalling programs?

O

october

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So I have been using a mac for 4 months now and I have one question that has been bugging me for a bit. I have been used to a pc for so long, and it kind of has rubbed off on me that deleting a application/program.you never remove it all completely..

is it really that simple with a mac..just drag the program icon to the trash? or is there something else you need to do to delete or uninstall a program?
 
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That is it but if you are really picky about small files left over go into the finder and search for the program

there will probably be some cache folders and .plist files left over (very small file sizes) that you can just drag to the trash
 
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Plist: User > Library > Preferences Plists you know are associated with a deleted application are clearly maked in my experience. Cache: User > Library > Cache
 
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O

october

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trpnmonkey41 said:
That is it but if you are really picky about small files left over go into the finder and search for the program

there will probably be some cache folders and .plist files left over (very small file sizes) that you can just drag to the trash

thanks..just the fact that its so simply..it reminds me of just deleting the shortcut on windows, but having the program still installed on the hd.
 
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Jefe3223

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Yes, that's pretty much it. I'm a fan of secure delete if i never ever want to see the thing again. The secure delete also reomves and temporary files (for reference) that may be used to recover it. Once it's gone like that, though, it's pretty well gone. I find that typeing the basic part of the name in "find" in the finder generally pulls up all related material and then you can eliminate the .plist like that. IMO.
 
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StarDrifter

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That's not quite true. I installed norton systemworks before and then wanted to remove it. Just dragging the program file to the trash didn't remove it.

So I did a find and search and deleted all files that contained the word "norton" in its title. Thought I had well and truly removed it then, but after a couple of days up popped some norton message thing.

So I ended up formatting and reinstalling OSX and my apps from scratch.

I wish OSX had an uninstall feature that removed all files associated with an app so that you don't have to manually drag and delete.

Removing firefox for example doesn't remove any of the preferences, bookmarks, cache etc .... they're all in another folder
 

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