Do I Have Duplicate Versions of IDEs Installed on My System?
This is the screenshot from my jetbrains toolbox (version 2.1.0.18144, Linux Mint 20.3 (Linux 5.4.0-166-generic), x64).
At the initial set up, I may have set up pycharm standalone, then I have likely set up jetbrains toolbox, and installed some other tools with it. Even I cannot retrace the steps now, and not sure if the toolbox automatically incorporates the standalone installations that existed before it (as in I can see the standalone versions, uninstall or update them etc. via the toolbox).
The point being, the toolbox seems to show some outdated versions installed, along with newer versions. When I try to install the outdated versions by clicking uninstall in the toolbox, I get an error message
The specified directory is not writable
The questions are
- Are the outdated versions eating my disk space?
- Are the versions totally independent, as in the plugins installed, the editor settings etc. or are those loaded from common configurations?
- How to remove the outdated versions without breaking the newer versions, while retaining as much of the settings and plugins as possible?
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Yeah, it seems like Toolbox should be able to detect any existing JetBrains install, even if you have to manually point it at the install folder.
Thanks. Any documentation on how to manually point the toolbox to the install directory, and how to remove duplicate versions?
Hello,
You see, the update button is inactive because, unfortunately, in the current implementation of Toolbox App, it cannot ask for elevated permissions to update these IDEs, which are installed in a directory that is not writable.
Please use the following article
https://toolbox-support.jetbrains.com/hc/en-us/articles/13696838691474-How-to-update-a-tool-if-The-installation-path-is-not-writable-error-is-shown-
They use disk space like any other installed program. You can remove them by clicking on the three dots next to the IDE.
Standard IDE behaviour is to use common directories for settings and configuration within the same major version. If you require isolated installations, you can do so by overriding the location for storing IDE settings. Please click on the three dots next to the IDE and go to IDE Settings, expand the Configuration section, set the Custom JVM option file location and then select the directory for System, config and logs.
Your settings are kept on the disc when you remove the IDE. You can also use the following feature
to synchronise settings and plugins https://blog.jetbrains.com/idea/2022/10/intellij-idea-2022-3-eap-3/#New_Settings_Sync_solution
This did not help. I updated by installing another version, but the previous one was still there. So then I ended up with three pycharms, until I removed one.
Basically, I got two each of Pycharm and Intellij, and none of them can be updated or uninstalled.
About updating directory permissions, I already checked the permissions of the directories in
/home/$USER/.config/JetBrains
which are all owned by myself, i.e. $USER and should be writable without sudo privilege.
This is happening to me to. Any ideas on how to remove/uninstall the duplicated ones? I get the permissions error.
Fiunchinho, how were they installed? Not via snap, by any chance?
I don't remember. Why?
Toolbox App cannot request elevated privileges in the current implementation so it cannot update or uninstall those installed via snap IDE. However, it finds them and displays them in the user interface.
But the folder where the old version is installed is writable by all users in the system. I did the change to try to fix the issue. Still ToolBox App can't uninstall it.