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Uninstalling Compiled Software

friendly_guy — Wed, 22 Oct 2003 23:52:05 GMT

Thanks for taking the trouble to reply.The one time I tried 'make uninstall' I guess I was unlucky as it didn't work!
I have found a brilliant answer to the problem myself with an app called 'checkinstall'.
This is run instead of 'make install' and creates a package before installation that can then be uninstalled in the normal way for your distro (it supports .rpm .tgz & .deb). This also has the bonus that the package can be shared with others.
It does appear to be able to be used retrospectively if you still have the source on your system to be able to run it with.

Uninstalling Compiled Software

thymox — Wed, 22 Oct 2003 20:38:27 GMT

If you still have the sources on your harddrive, then (as root) type *make uninstall*. This should work for most self-compiled software, but not all.

If you have long since removed the source files, but you still have the original .tar.gz (or whatever), then you may still be in luck! Unpack (tar zxpvf filename.tar.gz) it, run *./configure* and then run *make uninstall*.

If you're feeling like having a bit of a look around, then check out the *Makefile* file in the top level directory of your sources and see if there is an entry for uninstall.

Good luck.

Uninstalling Compiled Software

friendly_guy — Sun, 19 Oct 2003 00:37:52 GMT

Does anyone know what command/s to use to uninstall software that has been compiled from source?