How to uninstall MacGIMP [out of date hint!]

Nov 25, '03 10:52:00AM

Contributed by: Cunning Linguist

2005 Update: MacGIMP can be uninstalled by dragging to the trash. The original hint remains as published below...

This is my solution to the (serious) issue of uninstalling the over 360 files installed by MacGIMP.
I have looked everywhere and cannot find a decent solution to the problem... many folks seem to be asking how to do this so here goes.
First I made a list of the files I wanted to remove:

  1. open Terminal and navigate to your hard drive folder...

  2. create an empty text document. I used the following to do this:
    touch myfilename.txt
    Leave the document there (call it whatever you like, I used trashGimp.txt).

  3. type in the following:
    sudo find / -group 17025 -iname "*gimp*" | sort > trashGimp.txt
All that this will do is give you a sorted list of every file, directory and app that is assigned to group 17025 (which SEEMS to be the same number in all cases of MacGIMP installation... check and make sure) AND has some form of the word "gimp" in it. This is just so you can see what you are going to eliminate and where it came from
Now... how to remove it all... the easiest way would probably be to issue the following:
sudo find / -group 17025 -iname "*gimp*" -exec rm {} \;
This will only delete the files, not the actual directories that are included in this find. For that you need to substitute rmdir for rm. Note that directories that still contain items cannot be removed with rmdir.

Why do I want to remove MacGIMP? For one, I want to install fink and the fink ReadMe says not to use the installer if MacGIMP is present. Also, I am a professional Photoshop user and GIMP, while nice for people who don't want to shell out big bucks for a graphics app, cannot hold a candle to Adobe's product.

Any unix experts out there can undoubtedly improve on the methods listed here. I am just trying to get the issue out in the open as there are frustrated folks all over various discussion boards trying to figure out how to get rid of MacGIMP.

[Dec 22, 2003 Update: The information above regarding MacGIMP and the fink project is out of date -- MacGIMP and fink can happily co-exist. According to the MacGIMP folks, an upcoming release of MacGIMP will contain an uninstaller that makes removal of MacGIMP a simple process. I'm leaving this article online as a reference for those with older versions of the software; the reasons for removing it may differ person by person, but this hint and its comments contain useful information for those who wish to uninstall MacGIMP.]

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Mac OS X Hints
http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=2003111721531746