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I installed bluefish using sudo apt-get install bluefish. It was very buggy so I decided to remove it using sudo apt-get purge bluefish, and then using sudo apt-get autoremove Then I reinstalled it using sudo apt-get install bluefish again, and all the former settings were kept. Why is that?

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  • For clarity, the reason why this happens is that each user has his own (independent) settings, and uninstalling a program is not supposed to mess with every user's settings. It's part of the Linux security protocol.
    – Paddy Landau
    Jun 6, 2017 at 13:47
  • @PaddyLandau: If you know the answer to a question please write a proper answer instead of a comment.a
    – David Foerster
    Jun 25, 2017 at 9:39
  • @DavidFoerster I think that the OP was asking about the mechanics rather than the conceptual background. But thanks anyway :)
    – Paddy Landau
    Jun 25, 2017 at 14:56

3 Answers 3

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It's because user specific settings are stored in your home directory and that isn't removed. Try to find either bluefish directory under ~/.config or ~/.bluefish directory under home and remove it to reset the user preference.

Update: As Zanna mentioned in the comment (which is now removed), it's .bluefish under home.

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  • Thanks, it worked. Still, Bluefish is very buggy (For example, Apply and OK button for preferences won't work), which makes me wonder: If it's a specifically for Linux editor and it's still so buggy, should I keep using it? Is it safe? (It's off topic though)
    – Foobarer
    Jun 4, 2017 at 6:59
  • @Foobarer I don't use Bluefish now. I think you should consider using much better alternatives like Bracket (for front-end things) and/or sublime, atom etc. Everybody seems to be using those these days
    – Anwar
    Jun 4, 2017 at 14:02
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Some programs keep config preferences for installed software that the app will use for its installation and or use. This data is written to hidden files/folders in your home directory. You can view them by showing hidden files in Nautilus using Ctrl + H, or in a shell using ls -a to view the files. In your case, you want to remove the software and do a clean install. So, do what you were doing: sudo apt-get purge bluefish, find the program files in your home directory, and then manually remove them. Then you can do a clean re-install.

See these links for reference:

How to completely remove application

What is the correct way to completely remove an application?

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Sometimes, applications use their own folders to store their settings , so you need to remove the files from those folders. To see which folders are used by these applications, search for files with the name of the application you want to completely remove. I use the Catfish File Search application catfish for this, but any file-search app that searches through "hidden" folders will do. After you find the configuration files used for the application, delete them. You should find that upon running the application, the settings have been reset to their defaults.

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