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Remove files and folders with wildcard

  • April 5, 2019
  • 6 replies
  • 95 views
J
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We are in the process of moving some users to an Adobe Named User license. The only way I've gotten things to work is to do a clean uninstall of all previous Adobe applications which includes removing everything Adobe from the computer. I've been having to do this manually and as we ramp up I need to be able to do this in a script. I can script the Adobe Creative Cloud Cleaner Tool uninstall, but it still leaves Adobe files scattered throughout the file system.

How can I delete the following:
Any file or folder beginning with Adobe or beginning with com.adobe

From the following locations:
/Applications/
/Applications/Utilities/
/Library/Application Support/
/Library/Preferences/
~/Library/Application Support/
~/Library/Preferences/

Best answer by PaulHazelden

rm -Rf /Applications/Adobe*
rm -Rf /Applications/Utilities/Adobe*
rm -Rf /Library/Preferences/com.adobe*

If you check them all out on a sample Mac, you will get the idea.
rm is Remove
-Rf is Recursive and Forced, it will remove all sub folders too, you need this for directories.
Then the Path to the files/folders
The * is the Wildcard. Remember Adobe is different from adobe, if you have both you will need to script both.
I would create a rm for each path you have listed with the files.

Be careful, especially if you are running this as super admin, rm will delete the stuff any stuff.

    6 replies

    PaulHazelden
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    • PaulHazelden
    • Jamf Heroes
    • Answer
    • April 5, 2019
    rm -Rf /Applications/Adobe*
rm -Rf /Applications/Utilities/Adobe*
rm -Rf /Library/Preferences/com.adobe*

    If you check them all out on a sample Mac, you will get the idea.
    rm is Remove
    -Rf is Recursive and Forced, it will remove all sub folders too, you need this for directories.
    Then the Path to the files/folders
    The * is the Wildcard. Remember Adobe is different from adobe, if you have both you will need to script both.
    I would create a rm for each path you have listed with the files.

    Be careful, especially if you are running this as super admin, rm will delete the stuff any stuff.

    J
    L
    J
    Forum|alt.badge.img+10

    Thanks! That's way easier than I thought. I was looking online for this and saw all sorts of crazy commands using find and piping it to xargs and I was having no luck with that.

    PaulHazelden
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    • PaulHazelden
    • Jamf Heroes
    • April 8, 2019

    @Jeffery_Anderson I forgot to say, a quick way to see if you are getting the files you want replace the rm -Rf with ls -l and it will list the files it finds that match the path with wildcards. That way you can check the files and if it is going to catch anything you don't want to remove.

    T
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    • tlarkin
    • Honored Contributor
    • April 9, 2019

    Spotlight is your friend for this stuff, you can build data sets of file paths by using mdfind

    I actually have zero Adobe software installed on my Mac so I cannot test, but here is a test for Microsoft apps

    $ mdfind Microsoft -onlyin /Applications/
/Applications/Microsoft OneNote.app
/Applications/Microsoft PowerPoint.app
/Applications/Microsoft Word.app
/Applications/Microsoft Excel.app
/Applications/Microsoft Outlook.app

    you can then build logic to only remove the files you want instead of blindly doing it. Also, Adobe should provide uninstallers, correct?

    J
    M
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    • mschroder
    • Valued Contributor
    • April 9, 2019

    Adobe does provide uninstallers, and using them increases the chances that you remove all files, instead of just the ones you know about. Adobe installs plenty of stuff in /Library.

    You will need to properly quote the pathname of the unistallers when you run them from a jamf script, since Adobe like to put plenty of spaces in the filenames.

    J
    Forum|alt.badge.img+10

    The Adobe Creative Cloud Cleaner Tool and any application uninstallers from Adboe still leave Adobe files strewn throughout the file system. These remnants frequently impede subsequent Adobe application installations. My method of running the Adobe Creative Cloud cleaner tool along with deleting all the files I mentioned in the original post have always been the sure fire way to not get errors on a new Adobe CC install. I just needed a way to automate the entire process from a Self Service policy. I now have this done and it works beautifully.

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