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COMPUTER BITS BY JASON COLE Removing programs from Win95 Windows 95 has changed the way that PC users install and uninstall software. No longer are you left to your own resources. Instead, a wizard takes over and guides you through the process. A “wizard” is a function that guides the Windows 95 user through various steps and options by means of a series of dialog boxes, often with a quick sentence or two about what it is doing. Sometimes, the use of a wizard is optional but when in­stalling hardware and software, they appear automatically. A wizard makes the process of installing and removing hardware and software a truly “user friendly” operation. Once upon a time, before Windows 95, you were presented with a list of options when installing a program in DOS or Windows 3.x. Typically, there could be messages concerning the sound card, the program loca­tion, the monitor resolution and so on. Those people with experience in computers knew that these were questions, not statements; that the computer was asking you what sound card you had, where the program was to be copied to and what screen resolution you wanted to run. By contrast, in Windows 95, the installation’s wizard will ask something like: “Please select the location your program should be installed to”. Of course, the wizard will usually show a default location. You can either use this default location or you can easily select another location. The wizard steps you through your selections, prompts you for information, and gathers other details which are already known to Windows 95; eg, your name and organisation. When it has all the necessary information, the wizard works with Windows 95 to correctly install the software and will report on the success of your task. Uninstalling programs Fig.1: the Add/Remove Programs icon is in the Windows 95 Control Panel (click Start, Settings, Control Panel). Windows 3.x did not come with an uninstall utility, so deleting programs could be tricky unless you used a third party uninstall utility or the program came with an uninstall option. That situation changed with Windows 95. Once again, a wizard is used to uninstall programs. There are a number of ways to remove programs from Windows 95. The most common method is to use the Add-Remove Programs Icon in the Control Panel. You access the Control Panel by clicking Start, Settings, Control Panel. A window similar to that shown Fig.1 will appear. You then double-click the Add-Remove Programs icon to start the wizard – see Fig.2. To uninstall a program, simply highlight its name and click the Add/Remove button. Another dialog box will appear asking for confirmation. If there are multiple versions installed or if companion products were installed, a further dialog box will appear to make your uninstall requests more specific. The wizard will delete all components of the program, with the exception of custom documents or images. A comprehensive uninstall removes all relevant files and folders belonging to the program, as well as any July 1997  63 Fig.2: double-clicking the Add/Remove Programs icon in the Win95 Control Panel starts the Install/Uninstall wizard. information that may have been added to the Win.ini and System.ini files when the program was originally installed. When the uninstall process is complete, the wizard returns you to the original Add-Remove Programs dialog box. Occasionally, the uninstall option for a program may also appear in the Start menu or it may only be found there. For example, you uninstall Adobe PageMaker 6.5, by clicking Start, Programs, Adobe, PageMaker 6.5, Uninstall PageMaker 6.5. The wizard will report any problems that it encounters during the unistall process and you can refer to Windows Help (F1) if you don’t understand the message. This should help you overcome any problems. For example, files that cannot be located by the wizard can be removed manually. If the uninstall wizard asks for the installation disks, then provide them. If you cannot do this, make a note of the message and select “Ignore” to continue. In some cases, you may need to reinstall a program to enable correct uninstallation. If the wizard does not give you the ignore option or stops working, end the task by pressing Ctrl + Alt + Delete at the same time and then choosing close. In this case, manual deletion may be the only option left. If another program stops working after an uninstall, a quick reinstallation of the affected program will fix the prob­lem. A common problem with uninstall occurs when multiple ver­sions of Microsoft Office have been installed. This may happen, for example, where Office 97 has been installed but the previous version has been kept to give the user time to adjust to the latest offering. If the user subsequently decides to delete the old version, he quickly discovers that the wizard can only delete the new Office 97 version. The previous version isn’t an option any more. Microsoft overcame this problem by including a program called OFFCLN97.EXE (Office Clean 97) on the new CD. This program goes through the hard disc drive and removes any remnants of Office 95 or Office Ver. 4.X, so keep this in mind if you are ever in this situation. Occasionally a program may require an uninstallation Problems with uninstall As is the way with computers, an uninstall procedure does­n’t always go smoothly and the wizard may encounter a few prob­lems. A few typical examples are as follows: (1). The uninstall wizard may not be able to find all the program files. This is because some files have already been removed or relocated. (2). When removing some programs, you may be asked if you want to remove a file that’s shared by another program. Unless you know for certain that the file is not used by another program, do not remove it. Removing shared files can stop other programs from working correctly. For example, a spelling dictionary may be shared by Micro­soft Word and Microsoft Access. Remove it for one and it is no longer available for the other. Of course, this is just one example; other file types, including DLLs (dynamic link libraries), may also be also shared. (3). Sometimes, the original installation CD or disc must be in the drive in order for the wizard to work. 64  Silicon Chip Fig.3: to locate a DOS program, right click its shortcut icon, then click Properties and select the Programs tab. The program’s location is indicated by the Cmd line entry. is locat­ed? Simple – just highlight the program’s icon, then click File, Properties (or press ALT-Enter). The program’s location is indicated by the Command Line entry. The working directory will often be in the same location but this is not always the case. Once the relevant directory has been located, it can be erased using File Manager. To remove the program’s icon, simply select it and press the Delete key. A program group is removed in the same way. DOS programs & Windows 95 Fig.4: unwanted shortcuts and/or folders are deleted from the Start menu using the Taskbar Properties options. procedure that the standard uninstall wizard does not handle. In that case, the Setup utility that came with the program will usually do the job. A typical example is Microsoft Plus! (the add-on enhance­ment pack for Windows 95). Its setup program gives you three options: (1) Add/Remove; (2) Reinstall; and (3) Remove All. These first option is quite powerful because it lets you selectively delete (or add) certain elements of Plus! Windows 3.x As mentioned above, Windows 3.x did not come with an uni­nstall wizard. And although some Windows 3.x programs came with an uninstall option, most did not. Apparently, the programmers thought that once you started using a program, you wouldn’t want to delete it! Those programs that did provide an uninstall option worked in a similar way to those that ran under Window 95. However, they were often harder to understand and occasionally failed, either not working at all or only deleting part of a program. Sometimes, the uninstall utility of one program removed files that were also used by other programs. Always check the manual for a program when removing it from Windows 3.x. Often, it will give step-by-step instructions for removing the program and will list the entries that were added to System.ini and Win.ini. DOS programs & Windows 3.x DOS programs that run inside Windows 3.x are usually easy to unistall. Typically, this involves deleting: (1) program files and folders; and (2) Windows icons and groups. The question is, how do we know where the program The manual removal of DOS programs in Windows 95 is similar to the above procedure. The location of the program can be found by right clicking its shortcut icon and then clicking Properties and selecting the Program tab to bring up the dialog box shown in Fig.3. You also have to remove the shortcut, either from the desktop or from the Start menu (or both). If the shortcut is on the desktop, simply highlight the icon and hit the Delete key. If the shortcut is in the Start menu, you delete it using the Taskbar Properties option. To do that, click Start, Settings, Taskbar, then select the Start Menu Programs tab to get the dialog box shown in Fig.4. You then click the Remove button to get a list of directories and files similar to those shown by Explorer (only smaller in size). Now find the shortcut you don’t want, highlight it and press Remove. The shortcut will be sent to the Recycle Bin. You can delete unwanted folders from the Start menu in exactly the same fashion. Windows 3.x programs & Windows 95 What about Windows 3.x programs that have been installed under Windows 95? Those that don’t have an uninstall option are removed in the same manner as for Windows 3.x, except that files and folders are deleted using Explorer rather than File Manager. Another approach is to purchase an uninstaller program. An uninstaller program tracks the installation and keeps a record of it, so that it can uninstall the application later on. A popular choice is Uninstaller 4 which is designed for Window 95 and Windows NT but there’s also a version for Windows 3.x. Registry & ini files Windows 3.x used “ini” files to store program settings, the two most important being System.ini and Win.ini which are stored in the Windows directory. Any programs installed in Window 3.x added entries to these and to other ini files. That’s be­cause, during the Windows boot sequence, these files tell Windows what’s installed and where to find it. With Windows 95, however, most of the information is stored in the registry. It still stores some information in Win.ini and System.ini but this is for compatibility with older programs. By the way, Windows 3.x also stored some information in a registry but it was not used extensively. Do not go into the registry unless you have a backup and know exactly what you are doing. The registry is an important part of Windows 95 and should not be treated lightly. Remove the wrong bit of information and you SC may have to reinstall Windows 95. July 1997  65