346341 - Option for uninstaller to remove profile data [Thunderbird]

Status: NEW

(Thunderbird :: Installer, enhancement)

Description

[Jackie Liu]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.0.5) Gecko/20060719 Firefox/1.5.0.5
Build Identifier: 

This has been a problem for a long time, for many versions.  The uninstaller from many Mozilla programs (Firefox, Thunderbird, Sunbird...) leaves behind files from the installation.  I would like to see future uninstallers:
(a) remove the program folder and all it's subfolders in "Program Files"
(b) give the user the option to keep or remove the profile folder(s)

Reproducible: Always

Comment 1

[Robert Strong (they/them - no direct email)]

For versions greater than 1.5.x this is covered by bug 346351

Comment 3

[Majken Connor [:Kensie]]

hmm, realized the different components after I marked this as duplicate. Sorry about that.  Adding products to summary since the first comments are identical.

Comment 4

[Henrik Skupin [:whimboo][⌚️UTC+2] (away 07/21 - 08/08)]

I don't see this bug as a security issue. Also the support for 1.5 will end soon. Should this bug be resolved as WONTFIX? 

Comment 5

[brian martin]

The profile folders are left in "\Documents and settings\<user>\Application Data\Thunderbird". If certain add-ons are installed (e.g. Lightning), then potentially sensitive data is left behind.

This occurs on Thunderbird 2.0.0.14 - 2.0.0.16 as well. As mentioned above, the uninstall process should give the user the option to remove that folder as well as "\Documents and settings\<user>\Local Settings\Application Data\Thunderbird"

Comment 6

[Robert Strong (they/them - no direct email)]

Brian, that would be an option for the installer to remove the profile data that is not added by the installer and is different than this bug

Comment 7

[brian martin]

The original report, item (b) is an enhancement request to give users the option to remove the profile folder.

I brought this up because not only is the profile folder left behind, but this affects subsequent installations. If I install Thunderbird, install add-ons, uninstall Thunderbird and then re-install Thunderbird, it comes up with all of the previous add-ons and data associated with the add-ons (e.g. calendar events in Lightning). So there are two issues here; that files (or directories) installed by Thunderbird are not removed during uninstall, and that in doing so it potentially leaves sensitive information behind as well as influences the installation process if done again.

Comment 8

[Robert Strong (they/them - no direct email)]

Brian, sorry about that and you are correct. Changing summary accordingly.

The first request (a) in comment #0 is most likely WONTFIX. The uninstaller only remove files the installer added and the directories the installer added as long as they are empty. This prevents the uninstaller from removing files it is not responsible for which can be special directories if the user installed into my documents for example.

Comment 12

[u277459]

I'm so tired of people saying that uninstalling and reinstalling Thunderbird doesn't fix their problem.  Why would they know anything about "Profiles"?  They just use the program, not experts on how the program works.

When uninstalling, have the uninstall program look at the profiles.ini file and use that information for removing the Profiles.

Give the basic information that Profiles contain all the personal data such as messages, address books and configuration settings.  Show the Profile information retrieved from profiles.ini and let the user choose as to whether the Profiles are removed or not.

Comment 14

[Luca Moscato]

Not only sensitive data are (are, not could be) left behind but also a lot of GB. Big archives, not necessary linked to email account, could be left using a lot of disk space. To make an example, I have more or less 40GB of old email accounts generated by google takeout and imported using import/export tools addon