[Techtalk] removing installed programs

[Noir]

At 02:47 PM 10/26/2003 +0000, Telsa Gwynne wrote:
>(1) Keep the original source tree.
>(2) cd to where you typed 'make' and 'make install'
>(3) 'make uninstall'...
>     ...and hope the author included an uninstall target.
>If you have deleted the original source tree, then I dunno. I
>presume you can download the (same version of the) thing again,
>and unpack it into the place it was, and then do 'make uninstall',
>but I have never tried it.
>This is another of those lessons learned through experience:
>* Before you build something and do make install, check whether
>there is an 'uninstall' target in the Makefile, just in case you
>need to nuke it beforehand.
>* Keep source tree around if you think you will need to remove it
>all later.
>'target' is a word I only hear in conjunction with makefiles.
>Look at a makefile and you'll see things like 'clean', 'install',
>'dist' and so on. Those are the targets. When you do 'make something'
>rather than just make, it goes off and looks for the something
>in the makefile. If there is a rule for it, it will follow the
>instructions and do it.
>I think :)
>Telsa

Telsa:

Wow! Thanks for your elaborate, informative & rapid reply. Appreciated!

--Noir.