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Making macOS Apps Uninstallable

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Re: Making macOS Apps Uninstallable

#61

Post by bitwize »

mdmglr wrote: post #2

I recently had to uninstall some apps and it’s common for apps to litter files throughout /Library and ~/Library. The UX from early MacOS days is you can drag/drop the App to the Trash Can to uninstall it. Does MacOS actually clean up the misc. files applications leave at some point?

Wait wat

So macOS is as shitty as Windows in terms of app install?

Anyway, accepted wisdom now is that applications should only run containerized, which would make uninstall as simple as deleting the container.

Re: Making macOS Apps Uninstallable

#62

Post by naikrovek »

colonwqbang wrote: post #42
swatcoder wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes a product for consumers who want it, knowing that other successful and widely available products exist for other consumers. Apple’s choices may not be what everyone wants, but they’re not without upsides for those that do.

What is your point, really? What kind of "upside" for Lunar users are you alluding to?

you know, when you and the throwaway account at the top of this thread talk in the ways you have here, you make it extremely easy to simply dismiss your opinions as those of a crazy crackpot.

challenging opinions and "randomly" putting things in quotes to make them appear "fabricated" are not how you win people to your side, or even trigger them to pause and think for a moment. this is how you encourage others to develop a strong aversion to anyone talking like you or anyone having the opinion you have.

with the most positive and pure tone possible: be constructive or be quiet; you're severely hurting your own cause.

Re: Making macOS Apps Uninstallable

#63

Post by smoldesu »

naikrovek wrote: post #62
colonwqbang wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is your point, really? What kind of "upside" for Lunar users are you alluding to?

you know, when you and the throwaway account at the top of this thread talk in the ways you have here, you make it extremely easy to simply dismiss your opinions as those of a crazy crackpot. challenging opinions and "randomly" putting things in quotes to make them appear "fabricated" are not how you win people to your side, or even trigger them to pause and think for a moment. this is how you encourage others to dev…

Conversely, citing the benefits of a broken system does not justify it's existence. Thousands of good things happen in broken systems, but that doesn't justify their failure points.

If Apple had effective processes that allowed for constructive solutions to this problem, we wouldn't be here today. Instead, we see Apple fighting regulators in Dutch court, ducking regulatory fines and funneling developers into a ancillary profit-driven toolchain. It's not just crazy crackpot opinions, it's a profit motivator and something Apple is clearly self-conscious about.

Re: Making macOS Apps Uninstallable

#64

Post by eyelidlessness »

throwaway892238 wrote: post #39

The thing I hate more than anything else about technology is when people make things that are intentionally shitty, for no other reason than they want it to be shitty. "Hello billion dollar company, I would like a way to install and uninstall my software in your operating system." "No." "Wh.... huh? Please?" "Pay us money and go through our app store." "Um....why? No? Please? Can't you just let me make software and g…

Prior to the MAS it was well understood that moving an app to the trash was roughly equivalent to “uninstall”. With the introduction of MAS, no one actually looked for this X button. Exactly zero billions were made safeguarding it. If it’s so trivial to make appear, it’s because it’s a convenience specifically afforded to people who use Launchpad.

I can’t think of a use case where one installs apps and runs them from websites but wants to uninstall them from the modern equivalent of At Ease.

Re: Making macOS Apps Uninstallable

#65

Post by [deleted] »

throwaway892238 wrote: post #39

The thing I hate more than anything else about technology is when people make things that are intentionally shitty, for no other reason than they want it to be shitty. "Hello billion dollar company, I would like a way to install and uninstall my software in your operating system." "No." "Wh.... huh? Please?" "Pay us money and go through our app store." "Um....why? No? Please? Can't you just let me make software and g…

[deleted]

Re: Making macOS Apps Uninstallable

#67

Post by naikrovek »

smoldesu wrote: post #63
naikrovek wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you know, when you and the throwaway account at the top of this thread talk in the ways you have here, you make it extremely easy to simply dismiss your opinions as those of a crazy crackpot. challenging opinions and "randomly" putting things in quotes to make them appear "fabricated" are not how you win people to your side, or even trigger them to pause and think for a moment. this is how you encourage others to dev…

Conversely, citing the benefits of a broken system does not justify it's existence. Thousands of good things happen in broken systems, but that doesn't justify their failure points. If Apple had effective processes that allowed for constructive solutions to this problem, we wouldn't be here today. Instead, we see Apple fighting regulators in Dutch court, ducking regulatory fines and funneling developers into a ancill…

> citing the benefits of a broken system does not justify it's existence.

citing the flaws of a working system does not justify its destruction, either.

I'm not saying anything about Apple or its actions, either way. I am only saying that the tone and language used in the two posts I referred to will drive people away from understanding what is being said and why it is important.

Re: Making macOS Apps Uninstallable

#68

Post by tzs »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #52

Uninstallable is nice, but how about something on making apps not in the app store trivially installable without developers paying Apple a ransom fee? Oh that's right, we can't control that, just have to pay the tax.

> Uninstallable is nice, but how about something on making apps not in the app store trivially installable without developers paying Apple a ransom fee?

Isn't that what the article shows how to do?

Re: Making macOS Apps Uninstallable

#69

Post by nerdponx »

pfp wrote: post #33
tacker2000 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is just unbelievable. The billion $$ company cant just automate the uninstall procedure for their users? How hard would it be to auto delete the contents of ~/Library? Or have some periodic auto clean? one can always dream, no? I wonder how many users that have uninstalled VMware still have 30 gigs of unused VMs lying around on their disk.

No. The user data, preferences etc under ~/Library/ belong to you - whether it's 3 kB of preference toggles or 3 decades of email. It would be "unbelievable" if a multibillion company decided to be helpful and erase your data just because you deleted the binary that created them (actually, it wouldn't, but let's not digress into how those companies are stripping away our agency by mobile-ossifying everything). The wh…

Consider that sometimes people do actually want to clean up all artifacts of an installation, and don't want to go digging around in a bunch of machine-generated directories trying to guess what to delete.

I think I agree that the default behavior should be to leave all that data on the user's system. But I also think that apps should have some kind of associated file manifest, which you can use to automatically clean up after the app, or at minimum get a definitive list that you can go through manually or with a script.

It turns out that Apple installer packages do include a manifest (cutely called a BOM) of package contents, but users don't typically keep package installers around after completing installation successfully, and it says nothing about files that may be written by the app itself while in use.

I don't see how you could possibly claim that the user library "ruined" anything. Most apps need to save some kind of settings and/or transient data files. Where else would they go?

Re: Making macOS Apps Uninstallable

#70

Post by fastball »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #52

Uninstallable is nice, but how about something on making apps not in the app store trivially installable without developers paying Apple a ransom fee? Oh that's right, we can't control that, just have to pay the tax.

Download > Drag into /Applications isn't easy enough for you?
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