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I am using a MacBook Pro running Mac OS X 10.5. I am new to this development environment, and previously worked on Windows.

For the software I installed, how can I uninstall them? I did not find something like the Add/Remove programs function of the Windows Control Panel.

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3 Answers

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While you can simply drag the .app out of the Applications folder and into the Trash, this will often leave at least a few preference files laying around.

I use (and highly recommend) you use AppZapper instead.

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A free application doing the same is AppCleaner. – Felix May 23 '10 at 14:33
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I found AppZapper works faster then AppCleaner. – Josh K May 23 '10 at 15:54
@Josh, AppZapper is not free? – George2 May 24 '10 at 0:48
AppCleaner is very easy to use. Thank you! – George2 May 24 '10 at 0:53
@George2: Nope, it's $13 or so. Not much money for a very useful app. – Josh K May 24 '10 at 1:02
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up vote 2 down vote

The files to be deleted can be found usually in in your file system under:

  • home/applications/*
  • home/application support
  • home/library/preferences
  • home/library/preference panes
  • /<harddrive>/library/application support/*
  • /<harddrive>/library/preferences/*
  • /<harddrive>/library/preference panes/*

So delete the primary icon and then look for associated files in these areas. What other areas am i forgetting?

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why is my paragraph not formatted correctly? i would not have intentionally made the files hard to read, nice job superuser admins; – user38066 May 23 '10 at 14:43
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superuser.com/editing-help That should solve ALL your problems :) – S.Hoekstra May 23 '10 at 14:48
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Because you have not learned how to properly format your answer. Please read the link S.Hoekstra provided. – Josh K May 23 '10 at 15:56
up vote 1 down vote

Generally, for Macs it's so simple that you think there's got to be more to it. You can simply drag the application to the trash. Or you can right mouse click and select "Move to Trash". There may be a few applications which include an "Uninstall.app" file, in which case you should run that program. Probably this question has been answered previously, but I didn't do a search for it.

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A google search showed a nice explanation at aroundcny.com/technofile/texts/mac031004.html – Marnix A. van Ammers May 23 '10 at 14:20

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