Uninstalling Files Created by the Application

Files that are installed as part of your Tarma Installer project are automatically removed from the customer's computer when your application is uninstalled. However, some applications create additional files after installation that should be removed as well. The current topic describes how to deal with these files.

Note - You should never remove the customer's documents, i.e., the files that your customer created and saved while working with your application – whether it be text documents, images, multi-media files, or whatever other kind of files your application is designed to manipulate. The current topic concerns only auxiliary files created and used by your application such as scratch files, caches, and perhaps configuration files.

Tip - Tarma Installer automatically removes certain files that are created by Windows on behalf of your application, for example:

• .gid, .ftg and .fts files that WinHelp creates for .hlp files;
• .oca files that Visual Basic creates for .ocx files.

You do not have to specify removal rules for these file types.

How to uninstall files created by your application

To specify files that must be removed when your application is uninstalled, even if they were not installed by Tarma Installer, act as follows.

1. Select the Project - Files page by clicking on its bullet in the Navigation area.

2. Decide in which folders your application creates the files that must be uninstalled. Do not use hard-coded paths such as C:\Program Files\MyApp, but use names like:

   • <AppFolder> or a subfolder for the majority of your application's files. This name represents the main installation folder for your application. Its default location is set on the Installation page; if you allow this, the customer may select a different location at installation time.
   • <WinDir> for (shared) files that appear in the Windows folder.
   • <WinSysDir> for (shared) files that appear in the System folder.
   • Any of more than fifty other symbolic folder names.
3. If necessary, create the required folders by right-clicking on Installation Files, then choosing Insert Special Folder to add special folder variables.
4. Right-click on the installation folder of your choice, then choose Insert Blank File.

5. Select the newly added Unnamed file in the Installation Files List to display its Installation file settings pane, then adjust its settings as follows:

   • Source path - Enter the name of the file that must be removed. Do not enter a full path; only specify the file name proper (the path is taken care of by the installation folder in which the file resides).
   • Sharing - Set as appropriate. In most cases, you should select Not shared because your application probably does not set the SharedDlls reference count for this kind of file.
   • Registration and REG file - Set as appropriate. In most cases, you should select No self-registration and leave the REG file box cleared because your application probably does not register this kind of file.
   • Actions - Check the Uninstall box; clear all others.
6. Repeat steps 4-5 as required for other files.

Wildcard file masks

If you need to remove a variable number of files, the names of which you do not know in advance, you can use wildcards in the Source path specification in step 5. For example, to remove all backup files during uninstallation, specify *.bak. This only works for Uninstall files; if you also check the Install action, the build will fail.