Hey, I'm still struggling with the LFS and don't understand where to find the "make uninstall" file for software I've installed that I may uninstall it.

I'm using Ubuntu 9.10 and understand installing/removing .deb packages - that's straightforward. The problem I'm having are files that end in ".sh" or ".bin" , ".run" etc. or, the tar balls I download (I guess I would be compiling from source if I use these?)

I know sometimes they have an option like "--uninstall" but not all of them do. I know about the "make uninstall" command but this is where I get confused. Let's say, for instance, I download "foo.tar.bz2", decompress it, configure, make, install - is the "make uninstall" installed into the same folder where the rest of the program is installed, or was it created in the folder where I ran "./configure"? I've been looking in the folders of installed applications and none of them have this "make uninstall" file I keep reading about.

Is there a procedure I should follow as a rule of thumb when installing from .tar file? (Once again, I'm not sure if this is called 'compiling from source' so if someone would correct my understanding it would be a great help) Is the idea to configure, make, install then delete that folder because the software is installed, or do I keep that decompressed folder for later use if I have to uninstall?

Thank you kindly for your help. My knowledge of Linux is very superficial, so please bear that mind.

uninstall is a target in the Makefile. Thus, in general you would run "make uninstall" in the same directory where you ran, "./configure", "make" and "make install". In this case it is a reasonable idea to keep the untarred source directory so that you can easily run "make uninstall" at a latter time. To save, disk space you can run "make clean" after running "make install", this will preserve the information needed to later run "make uninstall".

Evo2.

Good to know. I thought that might be the case. If I only knew then what I know now.

Seeing how those tars are gone what are my options? Just delete the folders? Is there a likelihood of residual files being places in other folders I would possibly have to clean?