4 ms·

Launcher wipes entire SSD when uninstalling

59 points by Reedx 6y ago

polygot 6y ago
> If you have installed Minecraft Dungeons in a custom directory, there is a chance uninstalling Minecraft Dungeons Launcher and/or the game will remove the entire parent directory and everything in it. It doesn't erase the entire disk when uninstalling (just the parent directory), however, the bug is still extremely troubling.
- lagilogi 6y ago
  It would if you installed it right in C: without subfolder. It would definitely was all your games if you installed in your games directory without a subfolder of it's own.
elitistphoenix 6y ago
They probably should check those wildcards a bit more thoroughly.
- tim-- 6y ago
  This is not a wildcard issue. If you installed Minecraft Launcher in "C:\Program Files", it would delete "C:\Program Files". It would not delete the files the installer created.
  - pixl97 6y ago
    This kind of issue isnt that uncommon. I accidentally installed a program to my desktop folder one time. And the uninstall just deleted it and all my existing files. Windows didnt like that at all.
    - SlackingOff123 6y ago
      > Windows had not seen such bullshit before
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
AnotherGoodName 6y ago
The original half life release did this too back in the day. It would lead to the entirely of program files being deleted based on a default install.
londons_explore 6y ago
While annoying, this doesn't delete system restore info, so you can just rollback the system to 5 minutes before the installation and get back all your stuff.
geoelectric 6y ago
OMG they reimplemented the infamous Myth 2 bug. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_II:_Soulblighter#Uninstall_bug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_II:_Soulblighter#Uninstal...
- tyleo 6y ago
  Two other users mentioned that this also happened with Half Life and Phantasy Start. Makes me wonder if a lot of software has this bug and we only hear about it with the popular products. Also I wonder if something makes games especially prone to this sort of issue.
  - geoelectric 6y ago
    The Myth one was particularly infamous because it’d wipe your entire C or D drive if you installed to root, and because Bungie (doing the right thing) spent nearly a million because they found it literally a day or two after shipping final copies to stores and did a recall. I don’t think it actually had any significant field impact. As far as especially prone, custom installers were popular in the 90s (not even sure the windows MSI framework was there yet for the classic examples) and games get installed in weird places. Weird stuff gets overlooked in testing. Nobody ever tried installing it somewhere than Program Files is a reasonable guess, saying this as an expert in software quality. Totally plausible an entire org would have that blind spot. ...in the 90s. But anyone involved in old school PC gaming knows these examples and should be planning for them in test. This was a noob mistake at a business level, no lie.
  - Piskvorrr 6y ago
    Software happens to repeat the same bugs all over again. That doesn't imply that it's caused by the same mechanics: more like "who would have thunk that leap years/app installs/usernames are hard?"
amaccuish 6y ago
I see this as a failure of what a HN described elsewhere of securing the OS against a user and not apps as well. Ideally all apps would be security principals and appear in ACLs. Then say each file created couldn't be deleted by another app unless it was present in the file ACL. I believe APPX packages on Windows now do this, a new user is created for them.
- em-bee 6y ago
  this is what linux package managers do. the package itself doesn't handle deleting files at all, because the package manager, which tracks the files created at install time takes care of it.
Kaze404 6y ago
A similar thing happened with Phantasy Star Online 2 a while ago https://kotaku.com/my-feelings-on-pso2-issues-right-now-at-least-they-hav-1250340374 https://kotaku.com/my-feelings-on-pso2-issues-right-now-at-l...
dzaragozar 6y ago
Please use the original title: Launcher wipes entire install location when uninstalling
- Reedx 6y ago
  The title was "Launcher wipes entire SSD when uninstalling" when this was posted. They updated it since then: https://bugs.mojang.com/browse/MCL-14107#changehistorydetails_1603985 https://bugs.mojang.com/browse/MCL-14107#changehistorydetail...

59 points by Reedx 6y ago

> If you have installed Minecraft Dungeons in a custom directory, there is a chance uninstalling Minecraft Dungeons Launcher and/or the game will remove the entire parent directory and everything in it. It doesn't erase the entire disk when uninstalling (just the parent directory), however, the bug is still extremely troubling.

lagilogi 6y ago
It would if you installed it right in C: without subfolder. It would definitely was all your games if you installed in your games directory without a subfolder of it's own.

elitistphoenix 6y ago

They probably should check those wildcards a bit more thoroughly.

tim-- 6y ago
This is not a wildcard issue. If you installed Minecraft Launcher in "C:\Program Files", it would delete "C:\Program Files". It would not delete the files the installer created.
- pixl97 6y ago
  This kind of issue isnt that uncommon. I accidentally installed a program to my desktop folder one time. And the uninstall just deleted it and all my existing files. Windows didnt like that at all.
  - SlackingOff123 6y ago
    > Windows had not seen such bullshit before

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

AnotherGoodName 6y ago

The original half life release did this too back in the day. It would lead to the entirely of program files being deleted based on a default install.

londons_explore 6y ago

While annoying, this doesn't delete system restore info, so you can just rollback the system to 5 minutes before the installation and get back all your stuff.

geoelectric 6y ago

OMG they reimplemented the infamous Myth 2 bug. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_II:_Soulblighter#Uninstall_bug https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_II:_Soulblighter#Uninstal...

tyleo 6y ago
Two other users mentioned that this also happened with Half Life and Phantasy Start. Makes me wonder if a lot of software has this bug and we only hear about it with the popular products. Also I wonder if something makes games especially prone to this sort of issue.
- geoelectric 6y ago
  The Myth one was particularly infamous because it’d wipe your entire C or D drive if you installed to root, and because Bungie (doing the right thing) spent nearly a million because they found it literally a day or two after shipping final copies to stores and did a recall. I don’t think it actually had any significant field impact. As far as especially prone, custom installers were popular in the 90s (not even sure the windows MSI framework was there yet for the classic examples) and games get installed in weird places. Weird stuff gets overlooked in testing. Nobody ever tried installing it somewhere than Program Files is a reasonable guess, saying this as an expert in software quality. Totally plausible an entire org would have that blind spot. ...in the 90s. But anyone involved in old school PC gaming knows these examples and should be planning for them in test. This was a noob mistake at a business level, no lie.
- Piskvorrr 6y ago
  Software happens to repeat the same bugs all over again. That doesn't imply that it's caused by the same mechanics: more like "who would have thunk that leap years/app installs/usernames are hard?"

amaccuish 6y ago

I see this as a failure of what a HN described elsewhere of securing the OS against a user and not apps as well. Ideally all apps would be security principals and appear in ACLs. Then say each file created couldn't be deleted by another app unless it was present in the file ACL. I believe APPX packages on Windows now do this, a new user is created for them.

em-bee 6y ago
this is what linux package managers do. the package itself doesn't handle deleting files at all, because the package manager, which tracks the files created at install time takes care of it.

Kaze404 6y ago

A similar thing happened with Phantasy Star Online 2 a while ago https://kotaku.com/my-feelings-on-pso2-issues-right-now-at-least-they-hav-1250340374 https://kotaku.com/my-feelings-on-pso2-issues-right-now-at-l...

dzaragozar 6y ago

Please use the original title: Launcher wipes entire install location when uninstalling

Reedx 6y ago
The title was "Launcher wipes entire SSD when uninstalling" when this was posted. They updated it since then: https://bugs.mojang.com/browse/MCL-14107#changehistorydetails_1603985 https://bugs.mojang.com/browse/MCL-14107#changehistorydetail...