How to silently remove Visual Studio .NET in administrative mode

This step-by-step article describes how to silently remove Visual Studio .NET when it has been installed in administrator mode.

Microsoft Visual Studio .NET offers an administrator mode setup that you can use to perform silent installation and deployment to a client computer. When you run the uninstall program in the unattended mode, Setup silently removes the administrator designated options without any user interaction or display.

Create the INI File for Removing the Program

You will create an .ini file that is based on the options you select for removal. Setup uses this .ini file to remove Visual Studio .NET on the remote computer.

Note Before you perform the steps to remove the program, you must have Visual Studio .NET installed on the administrator computer.

To create the uninstall .ini file, follow these steps:

1. Insert Visual Studio .NET CD 1 or DVD, and then close the autorun message.
2. Click Start, and then click Run.
3. Type the following path:
   n:\setup\Setup.exe /createunattend path of INI file\INI File Name
   For example:
   d:\setup\setup.exe /createunattend c:\vs7_uninstall.ini
4. On the Visual Studio .NET Maintenance screen, click Uninstall Microsoft Visual Studio .NET. The uninstall .ini file is created automatically at the location that you specified in step 3. For example, C:\Vs7_uninstall.ini.
   
   The Done link appears on the Visual Studio .NET Maintenance screen when the program has successfully created the .ini file and saved it at the specified location.
5. Click Done to close the Visual Studio .NET Maintenance screen.

Remove Visual Studio .NET

The following steps describe how to use the .ini file that you created in the previous procedure to remove the selected options of Visual Studio .NET in the unattended mode:

1. Verify that Visual Studio .NET is available on the network computer. (See "Creating a Network Image" in the Adminreadme.htm file. This documentation is located on Visual Studio .NET CD 1 or DVD.)
2. Click Start, and then click Run.
3. Type the following path:
   "\\computer\share\...\setup\Setup.exe" /unattendfile path of .INI file\.INI File Name
   For example:
   "\\Computer\VisualStudio\setup\setup.exe" /unattendfile "\\computer\share\vs7_uninstall.ini"
4. Click OK.

For more information about how to install Microsoft Visual Studio .NET in Setup Administrator mode, see the Adminreadme.htm file that is located in the Setup folder on Visual Studio .NET CD 1 or DVD.