[Q] How does the 'uninstall' work?

[cty12]

Some apps place plug-ins and even kernel extensions when installing. They may modify some preference lists as well. As far as I know the uninstall process of Mac App Store does not bother to deal with those. It only removes the app bundle.

So how does brew-cask deal with this problem? For example if I run 'brew cask uninstall google-chrome', is Chrome absolutely uninstalled?

[guoye-zhang]

Mac App Store doesn't allow kernel extensions or plug-ins. All preferences are stored in sandboxes (~/Library/Containers/). So it's clean when uninstalling.

As far as I know, if installed through pkg, cask will remove what pkg installs. If there is no pkg, just an app inside dmg or zip, cask will delete the app. So preferences will not be deleted.

[cty12]

Many thanks.

[rolandwalker]

@cty12 when you run brew cask uninstall google-chrome, it is absolutely uninstalled. That Cask works via an Application link, which is the easiest thing for our backend code to manage.

@cc941201 , when something is installed via a pkg, life is more difficult. It depends on the Cask author to define a stanza called uninstall. You can see us working this out for a Cask in #2683. Cask authors will always have to define uninstall explicitly, because a pkg is allowed to run arbitrary scripts at install-time. However, making uninstall stanzas easier to write, and making uninstall work smoother, is an area of very active work: #2526, #2526, #2689, #2618, etc, etc.

And as to your original question, @cty12 , there are specific uninstall directives for removing kernel extensions with pkg installs (the :kext key, described in CONTRIBUTING.md). We plan to extend that functionality soon, so that App-style casks can also call for kext removal if needed.

[vitorgalvao]

I’m not sure the definition of “absolutely” is clear, in this case. If you’re referring to something like also deleting the preference files like this, then no, brew cask uninstall google-chrome will not do it for you.

[cty12]

@rolandwalker Thank you. It's very helpful.