So I was sitting tonight, minding my business using my mac, when all of a sudden a window appears on my screen. It’s an ad for a CorelDraw sale (I’ll attach it here if I can... Looks an awful lot like the ones I see on my PC). Now I know what you are thinking… I was using Corel, I was surfing the web… nope! I had Mac mail open, I was writing in iMessage and not another thing was open and running! Most Mac users would find this peculiar I would think?
When I click it, it does not identify its host program in the title bar, only finder. I cannot resize or change the window in any way… there is only the ability to close it. I move if off to the side of the screen to investigate further. I open and close various programs, still there. I start activity monitor and look for any services running that may contribute to this… nothing jumped out at me, though I'm not sure what I'm looking for.
I figured it was because I had downloaded the Mac demo of CDGS2020. I want it to be great, the Mac version… but it’s never quite been as fully cooked as the PC counterpart, so I continue to use it in a VM. A little miffed at Corels apparent intrusion, I decide I’ll remove the demo from my machine. Wait… I already did? Thats right… my demo expired, and I tossed it in the trash, and emptied it some time ago... maybe a month or more? My PC version resides in a VM on my desktop... not even my laptop!
To be sure however, I did a search and spotlight returned a massive amount of data. My library folder is FULL of Corel files… gigs worth of information, not just a few pesky leftover files. The application is gone, but not the additional data.
So the question that begs to be asked, how was Corel able to serve up advertising to me, for software that was uninstalled from my Mac? I have never had another popup window suddenly appear like this before, offering ads, especially without identifying itself on my Mac. Especially after said software is supposedly removed from the computer? Which… with gigs of leftover data in my library folder, I would hardly consider this “removed”. Did the developers get sloppy?
A moot point, but when I hit the X to close the window finally, it rather awkwardly moved itself to the middle of my screen, and slowly scrolled itself out of site under my taskbar!
Anyone got any explanations? Corel? Care to explain?
Sorry, the TL;DR version would be “why does Corel leave behind SO much data after it’s been uninstalled, and what gives Corel the right to have unrestricted access, to serve me ads on my Mac within my OS... not browser, AFTER I have uninstalled their software?”
It's rude and very annoying on both the PC and the Mac. It's what you would expect from free shareware and not at all professional.
The best way that I have found to remove all of the leftover junk, is to run an application, called "AppClearner.app". You probably have to google for it, the application has the ability to root out all of the left-over files and folders and allow you to select those that you can completely remove.
I have had to use this cleaner on my mac, many times. I like it, and find it very useful.