Uninstallers are for people who want to stop using an application, so that’s no real priority here - don’t let the door hit you on the way out. Unfortunately, uninstallers aren’t a high priority to most application developers. Even if things were placed in completely random, non-standard locations, the uninstaller for a specific program should know what all those locations are. Presumably the uninstaller has the same knowledge the installer had: what things were put where. Most programs provide an uninstaller, which is, of course, the first approach to … well … uninstalling. There’s really no standard that an application need adhere to. Worst of all, while there are guidelines, they’re not enforced. There are many, many different things that could be installed, and many different places to keep them. There are probably more that I’ve overlooked, and almost certainly more that are unique to some applications. For example, many applications include their own “recent documents” list. Registry settings or other information accumulated by the application as you use it.Registry settings that control the behavior of the application, or store the settings you make as part of the setup process or as you use the program.Microsoft Word’s default templates are a great example. The files that include templates, configuration files, default documents, and more used by the application once installed.An example here is the infamous “Microsoft Visual C Runtime”, which is a library of software used by many other applications. The files that make up components that may be shared with other programs.Examples include “excel.exe” for Microsoft Excel, or “chrome.exe” for the Google Chrome browser. The files that make up the software itself.Let’s start by looking at all the different things that may get copied or created when you install software. Perhaps the answer is easier than I thought: how can you completely uninstall a program? You can’t. That some programs share components with other programs is only the tip of the iceberg. This turns out to be a surprisingly difficult question to answer.Īs you’ve discovered, software installation is not simple.
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