Re: "Select * from Win32_Product" Not Finding All Apps

Tech-Archive recommends: Speed Up your PC by fixing your registry

On 19 May, 04:45, "mayayana" <mayaXXyan...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
As James Whitlow said, you want to run the UninstallString
value from the Uninstall key.
The Win32_Product WMI class is just a partial wrapper around
MSI. You can get at that directly with the
WindowsInstaller.Installer object. But if you didn't install the
program with an MSI file then Windows Installer doesn't know
about it and Windows Installer can't uninstall it.

Frankly, the whole Windows Installer system is overproduced
crap that's only used by companies that want to cooperate
closely with Microsoft. A great deal of 3rd-party software,
and most older software, is NOT packaged as an MSI. So unless
you're dealing only with one specific, known program you need
to go though the Registry, like the Add/Remove applet does.


Hi Mayayana/James,

Thankyou for your input.

I have found the uninstall keys as pointed out by James (thanks
James).

Mayayana can I use these 'uninstall' strings to silently uninstall
applications outside of WMI? Is that what you were referring too by
"go(ing) though the Registry, like the Add/Remove applet does"? If so
could you point me in the right direction for achieving that? I'm a
bit out of my depth here and I'm not sure how to use these uninstall
strings.

7-Zip is just an app I'm picking on for testing purposes as its a
quick job to reinstall it if need be. But there is a whole series of
apps that I'm trying to uninstall (Winrar, Powerdvd, Nero, Mcafee,
Photoshop, Paintshop, Winzip... with plenty of others to follow), and
some of them appear not to have been installed by the Windows MSI. So
as it stands my script isn't looking too great at the moment as I've
built the whole thing around WMI in the assumption it would work for
any application (after testing it with McAfee and finding that it
worked flawlessly I didn't think to try it on anything else - stupid-
arse!).

Thanks again,

Colin
.

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