What is Digg?17 Comments
- ajchavar, on 10/12/2007, -1/+18you can also use it to make your CS3 beta last forever. . .
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7Or, just drag to the trash. No need to right-click or control-click.
- SteveMax, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6It's easier than you think. Select it, right-click, move to trash, empty trash.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4> Everyone keeps saying it's so easy with mac, just drag an app
> to the trash, but even if it is a drag-and-drop install app, it will
> still have it's ~/library/application support/ and preference files
> there still there.
The situation is exactly the same on Windows. Most uninstallers do nothing more than delete the files that were copied over during the install, and undo any system configuration changes (e.g. file associations) in the registry. Files, caches, preferences, and registry settings created after the application was installed are not deleted by an uninstaller.
The difference is that on the Mac all of an application's files and system settings are stored inside the applications bundle, hence you can just drag the application bundle to the trash; on Windows, an application is scattered all over the place in the file system and registry, hence the need for installers and uninstallers for even the simplest applications.
The advantage the Mac has is that it does not obfuscate the user's home folder the way Windows does, so it's relatively easy to, say, go into ~/Library and locate an application's preferences and caches. On Windows it's much more difficult to clean up after an application after it has been uninstalled. - aristotle0dude, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Well said. Most windows switchers cannot get past the impression that those files will somehow affect the system performance because of how the windows registry seems to just grow and grow. OS X dynamically builds its database of which applications can open a particular file format. Once you delete an application, the references to that application just disappear from the application list after a couple minutes.
- taalatribe, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Do you mean uninstalling apps or packages? There is a big difference. If an app was installed by installer.app then no, just dragging the app to trash will NOT remove all files. Let's take Parallels for example. Just dragging the parallels folder to the trash will NOT remove all the files installed by parallels installer, it puts files in /library/parallels and also a bunch of files in /system/library/extensions. Also, take macfuse for another example, it installs files all over the place including hidden folders such as /usr.
If an application was installed via installer.app, a receipt detailing all installed files will be in your /library/receipts folder. You can double-click a receipt and then hit apple-i and it will show a log of all files installed. There are a few apps out there (desinstaller) that can remove them but they can be quite flakey and end up messing stuff up. Apple really need to address properly uninstalling packages. Most (but not all) apps also include a script to manually remove the files installed for their specific apps but I've found they often miss files.
Everyone keeps saying it's so easy with mac, just drag an app to the trash, but even if it is a drag-and-drop install app, it will still have it's ~/library/application support/ and preference files there still there. - taalatribe, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3>The situation is exactly the same on Windows
I hope you don't think I'm a windows user. Haven't used windows in about 2.5 years. I think the situation on windows is a lot worse.
>The difference is that on the Mac all of an application's files and system settings are stored inside the applications bundle
I was referring to apps that install via installer.app (.pkg packages) which the above statement is definitely not true in all instances. The reason why some apps are distributed as .pkg packages is because they install files 'all over the place', like kernel extensions etc. So, really I can't see how 'the difference" between windows apps installing all over the place and mac apps (AGAIN talking about .pkg packages). And AGAIN I'm a mac user - not a windows user. It's just one of those things that really annoy me about installing .pkg packages - you never really know where they are going to stick files (and yes I know about pacifist). - swindmill, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2"Everyone keeps saying it's so easy with mac, just drag an app to the trash, but even if it is a drag-and-drop install app, it will still have it's ~/library/application support/ and preference files there still there."
Apple hasn't addressed this because the space these support files takes up is negligible and removing them really is quite pointless. I happen to be somewhat anal about removing these things, but most people would never even think about it. - dgh1973, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1One of the best uses of this I've done is changing VLC's default tendency to pop up a separate control window despite controls already being displayed in the movie window.
- algorythmic, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1>the space these support files takes up is negligible and removing them really is quite pointless
I guess that's true for most apps, but if, for example, you drag and drop your copy of CS2 in to the trash you'll be left with over 600MB in /Library/Application Support. - jordan314, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Anyone have any tips on uninstalling packages in OS X? Doesn't seem to be any easy way...
- whistlerpro, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Ooh, the iCal tip is bogus, because that empty icon needs to be named that to be the background for all the custom icons once it's started, but I'm going to change the colour!
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1How about AppZapper - removes the associated files from the Library and Preferences
(I know its not 100% but its good enough for what i need) - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Installer.app has a "Show Files" command under the File menu when installing, and it shows what will be installed and where. I found that out courtesy of a Daring Fireball about Google Desktop. Handy.
- Spuy767, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I use the packages option and XCode Developer tools to change the layout and controls of the .nib.
- nronhubbard, on 10/12/2007, -6/+2really? have you a clue on where to look on how to do chage the beta date ; ) would be great to know....
thanks! - Topher06, on 10/12/2007, -6/+0Right click, right click....right click? Where is the right click key? BTW I am still waiting for my Tab.
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