How to uninstall almost any application in OSX manually


Well, you learn something new everyday. Here is what I picked up today….If you ever install an application that came as a OSX package, there is a good chance that the installer has installed files all over your machine. There is also a good chance that the installer has left you a little gift — a way out if you like — in /Library/Receipts folder on your mac.

You see, if the author/packager has done their job correctly (most do), there is a Bill Of Material (known as a bom file) that is copied onto your system. In the example below I wanted to check the files that got installed on my machine by the MacFUSE installer so here are the commands I issued:
Brainiac:/ mayromlou$ cd /Library/Receipts/MacFUSE\ Core.pkg/Contents/
Brainiac:Contents mayromlou$ ls
Archive.bom Info.plist PkgInfo Resources
Brainiac:Contents mayromlou$ lsbom Archive.bom

So in this case I cd to the folder for the application in question (under the /Library/Receipts folder) and go directly to the Contents Folder. Then I get a directory listing and notice that there is a Archive.bom Bill of Material file there. Then I proceed to issue the lsbom command which will decode the bom file and shows me the following output:
. 40755 0/0
./Library 41775 0/80
./Library/Filesystems 40755 0/0
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs 40755 0/0
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Contents 40755 0/0
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Contents/Info.plist 100644 0/0 2591 1626887788
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Contents/Resources 40755 0/0
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Contents/Resources/English.lproj 40755 0/0
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/InfoPlist.strings 100755 0/0 6092 580475608
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Contents/version.plist 100644 0/0 456 3975516369
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support 40755 0/0
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support/fusefs.kext 40755 0/0
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support/fusefs.kext/Contents 40755 0/0
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support/fusefs.kext/Contents/Info.plist 100644 0/0 1032 1833265120
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support/fusefs.kext/Contents/MacOS 40755 0/0
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support/fusefs.kext/Contents/MacOS/fusefs 100644 0/0 282292 3125657523
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support/fusefs.kext/Contents/Resources 40755 0/0
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support/fusefs.kext/Contents/Resources/MacFUSE.xcconfig 100644 0/0 42 965707547
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support/load_fusefs 104755 0/0 29212 3910787877
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support/mount_fusefs 100755 0/0 52008 3511781209
./Library/Filesystems/fusefs.fs/Support/uninstall-macfuse-core.sh 100755 0/0 4419 3035817197
./usr 40755 0/0
./usr/local 40755 0/0
./usr/local/include 40755 0/0
./usr/local/include/fuse 40755 0/0
./usr/local/include/fuse/fuse.h 100644 0/0 28075 1689529217
./usr/local/include/fuse/fuse_common.h 100644 0/0 6623 3278924455
./usr/local/include/fuse/fuse_common_compat.h 100644 0/0 738 1569919976
./usr/local/include/fuse/fuse_compat.h 100644 0/0 8749 3548531510
./usr/local/include/fuse/fuse_darwin.h 100644 0/0 2304 4217317508
./usr/local/include/fuse/fuse_lowlevel.h 100644 0/0 40397 1846692219
./usr/local/include/fuse/fuse_lowlevel_compat.h 100644 0/0 7572 2140056707
./usr/local/include/fuse/fuse_opt.h 100644 0/0 7307 3645063899
./usr/local/include/fuse.h 100644 0/0 246 2097503619
./usr/local/include/ulockmgr.h 100644 0/0 701 3653182913
./usr/local/lib 40755 0/0
./usr/local/lib/libfuse.0.0.0.dylib 100755 0/0 272548 3600984730
./usr/local/lib/libfuse.0.dylib 120755 0/0 19 2829363220 libfuse.0.0.0.dylib
./usr/local/lib/libfuse.a 100644 0/0 861224 2222446251
./usr/local/lib/libfuse.dylib 120755 0/0 19 2829363220 libfuse.0.0.0.dylib
./usr/local/lib/libfuse.la 100755 0/0 804 1483864331
./usr/local/lib/libulockmgr.0.0.0.dylib 100755 0/0 38900 610654515
./usr/local/lib/libulockmgr.0.dylib 120755 0/0 23 4013380549 libulockmgr.0.0.0.dylib
./usr/local/lib/libulockmgr.a 100644 0/0 41056 3770607053
./usr/local/lib/libulockmgr.dylib 120755 0/0 23 4013380549 libulockmgr.0.0.0.dylib
./usr/local/lib/libulockmgr.la 100755 0/0 832 341285231
./usr/local/lib/pkgconfig 40755 0/0
./usr/local/lib/pkgconfig/fuse.pc 100644 0/0 276 3834070396

The listing above shows all the files that were installed by the MacFUSE installer, so now I can easily go through the list and remove the files (either command line or with Finder). Have fun uninstalling those uninstallable beasts :-).

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