Can't remove Office 2004

[Owen Mahoney]

I downloaded Office 2004 Test Drive and tried it, and then decided
that I will stick with Office v.X, which I have installed on my hard
drive. So I went to the Remove Office Program in the 2004 folder and
attempted to run it, several times. Each time, it put a bunch of files
in the trash but when I went back to my Applications folder, all the
2004 files and folders were still there. I then tried to move them to
the Trash, but got a dialogue box saying that 2004 Test Drive cannot
be removed.

What's going on? How can I get rid of this thing? Why doesn't Remove
Office do just that?

OM

 

[Anand]

Hi Owen,

In the system Preferences--Accounts--Your account---startup items--Select
Microsoft AU Daemon and click the "-" button, and this daemon should be
removed.
Restart the Mac.
Remove all the Office preferences and the .plist files in the preferences
folder.
Remove the 2003 identities and the Normal document in Microsoft user Data
folder
Remove the office 2004 folder
Remove the Microsoft automatic updated
Empty the trash.

Install office X.

Let me know if it works.

Anand P

 

[Owen Mahoney]

Hi Anand:

Thanks so much for your help. I am ready to try what you suggest, but
am having a little difficulty. I am in OS 10.2.8, and when I go to the
System Preferences and select my account from Accounts, there is no
option named startup items that I can see. All that is available to me
are "New User", "Edit User" and "Set Auto Login..." buttons.

I went to "Login Items" in System Preferences to look at the programs
that load at startup, and there are two programs named "Microsoft
Database Daemon", one for the Office v.X and another, presumably, for
Office 2004 Test Drive. One is checkmarked as hidden, the other is
not. Since there is no way for me to determine which Daemon is for
which version of Office, I have not risked removing either of these
daemons. I can find nothing called Microsoft AU Daemon.

I have a brother who is running Panther and I know that System
Preferences for him in 10.3 differ slightly from their counterparts in
10.2.8, which is what I have.

Am I on the right track in going to Login Items in System Preferences?

Owen

 

[Oz Springs]

I have just discovered there is a startupitems folder in the main library
folder for my Mac, not one in my user library folder. Have you checked in
there?

You can remove both of the Microsoft Daemons in your login items. I don¹t
have one in my login items. I think it is just checks for updates?

Also, when you used the Remove Office program did you take the Remove Office
from the Office 2004 testdrive folder? You should put it on the desktop or
somewhere else. If you leave it in the Office 2004 folder then you are
asking it to self-destruct - a difficult thing to do when it is operating.

HTH



Oz

 

[Diane Ross]

I went to "Login Items" in System Preferences to look at the programs
that load at startup, and there are two programs named "Microsoft
Database Daemon", one for the Office v.X and another, presumably, for
Office 2004 Test Drive. One is checkmarked as hidden, the other is
not. Since there is no way for me to determine which Daemon is for
which version of Office, I have not risked removing either of these
daemons. I can find nothing called Microsoft AU Daemon.

Remove them both. When you launch Entourage it will create a new one
automatically.

The Daemon allows you to use Notification even if Entourage is not open.

For more detailed info on the daemon see:

<http://www.entourage.mvps.org/glossary/daemon.html>

 

[Diane Ross]

Thanks so much for your help. I am ready to try what you suggest, but
am having a little difficulty. I am in OS 10.2.8, and when I go to the
System Preferences and select my account from Accounts, there is no
option named startup items that I can see.

I believe the name was Login Items in Jaguar. In Panther, the login/startup
items are under Accounts.

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

I have just discovered there is a startupitems folder in the main library
folder for my Mac, not one in my user library folder. Have you checked in
there?

I wouldn't play too much with this one unless you really know what you
are doing. It's not like it's equivalent in MacOS 9.
In Panther, login items are in the Account pref-pane (it has its own
prefpane in earlier versions).

You can remove both of the Microsoft Daemons in your login items. I don't
have one in my login items. I think it is just checks for updates?

It's not there. It would only have an entry in the login items for your
account in the Accounts prefpane. The daemon is mostly used for
notifications (tasks, calendar entry...). I think it is also used for
project management with the other Office apps, but that's not so clear
to me.


Here is what I cowould do: Quit all Office apps, delete all the entries
for the Office daemon in the Login Items prefpane, and log out, then
back in to make sure they are not running anymore (that's the easiest
way). Then you can launch Entourage X to make sure it's daemon is
relaunched and added again to the Login items, and trash the other one
that shouldn't be running anymore.


If you are somewhat familiar with the Terminal, you can quit the process
from there and you wouldn't have to log out and back in. I'm not sure
the Activity Monitor in 10.2.x lets you gently quit a process like it
does in 10.3.



Corentin

 

[omahoney1]

Thanks to all of you--Anand, Oz, Corentin and Diane-- who have
contributed suggestions, I have been able to remove Office 2004 Test
Drive.

I went into Login Items in System Preferences, as suggested, and
removed both Microsoft Database Daemons, as suggested by Diane, and
logged out and back in. Then, acting on Oz's advice, I removed the
Remove Office program from the 2004 Test Drive folder (where I had
incorrectly been running it from), and moved it to the desktop. I then
ran the Remove Office program and it ran smoothly, removing the
preferences. I was then able to trash the Office 2004 Test Drive
folder, without being denied permission.

Thanks to all of you.

Owen