Is there a way to save applications prior to reformatting?

[beancurd5]

Hi all,

I'm about to buy a new MacBook Pro from a friend. She just got a new job that will be issuing her a company MacBook Pro, so now she doesn't need hers anymore.

Anyway, she burned from a friend Photoshop, Microsoft Office and a few other applications. But I am planning to reformat the disk when I take the new computer from her to wipe out any trace of her personal files, etc.

I'm wondering, is there any way for me to "preserve" the applications she burned? Can they be transferred to an external drive or something like that before I do the reformatting?

I guess I could try to grab the apps from a torrent site or something, but I don't want to go through the trouble. And obviously there are no original disks for any of the applications since they were ripped from a friend's disks.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

 

[Frosties]

Make a new account on the computer and delete the old one after checking that all is well and you have full system rights in the account manager. Done. If you have trouble use the os x install disc to reset the root password.

One other thing. Photoshop have some licenses connected to each machine and a user have a limited machines supported. It could happen that your machine will be taken off the supported list in the future by the original license holder. Just a fyi.

 

[Corndog5595]

Legalities aside…

App information is usually stored in three or four different places, so in theory you just have to find all traces of the app, copy those files to some form of external storage, reformat, and copy them back over.
I really don't know if this will work though.


App contents could exist in any of these places:

• /Applications/AppName.app
• /Library/Application Support/AppName
• /Library/AppName
• ~/Library/AppName
• ~/Library/Application Support/AppName

Edit: I forgot the easy method of just creating a new account and deleting the old (above post).

 

[beancurd5]

OK, so..

..I'm a bit of a newbie, can you guys tell me how I create the new account and delete the old one? I guess I have to go to system preferences>accounts, but I'm not sure how to actually delete/add and make sure I get all user rights on the new account.

Thanks for all your help!

 

[Corndog5595]

1. Go To System Preferences
2. Open Up The Accounts Preference Pane
3. Click The Lock In The Bottom-Left Corner
4. Click The Add [+] Button
5. Click The "New Account: Standard" Dropdown Menu And Select Administrator
6. Fill In All The Required Fields
7. Log In To This Account
8. Do Steps 1-3
9. Select The Old Account And Click The Remove [-] Button

 

[beancurd5]

Awesome..

..thank you so much!