Windows 10: Updating .bat File, Removing Default Apps

That should work too. The point is the .bat has to run in an elevated command processor in order to be able to run powershell at an elevated level.

 

So this is my .bat. Why do I get errors on each line?

 

This is one of your lines...
Code: PowerShell -Command "Get-appxprovisionedpackage –online | where-object {$_.packagename –like "*CandyCrushSodaSaga*"} | remove-appxprovisionedpackage –online"[/quote] I copied it, saved it to a .bat and tried to run it. I got errors too. In fact, there are two problems.

First, look very carefully at each occurrence of –online. That is not a 'minus' sign (as it should be) at the beginning, It should look like this : -online (note the almost imperceptible difference between the – and - characters). I'm not surprised you didn't spot it. Just find and replace all – with - and it will work. (There's also a wrong – before like.)

It looks like this problem may be in the code lines as copied from @Brink's tutorial,

The second problem is the use of the " quotes character. You have put quotes around the command to pass to powershell, but the command itself uses the " quotes character around the *packagename* bit. As written in your command line, only the part of the command between the first pair of quotes is passed to powershell. Effectively the command is interpreted as...

...the remainder of the line is being ignored.

To correct that you need to use two different 'quote' delimiters. Use ' instead of " around each *packagename*.

So, a working (and tested) version of your line above with both errors corrected is... Code: PowerShell -Command "Get-appxprovisionedpackage -online | where-object {$_.packagename -like '*CandyCrushSodaSaga*'} | remove-appxprovisionedpackage -online"[/quote] nb. don't forget to run the .bat as Administrator.

 

I tried to changed everything you recommended. I am still getting errors. Do you see what is still wrong?

 

OK! I got it working.

Some of them had this line appear under the code and some didn't. Is that a problem?

 

No, it is normal.

If something was removed you get it. If it wasn't (for example you try to remove a package that doesn't exist) you don't.

You could consider deleting the junk from %appdata% as well. This is what I do: PHP Code: ForEach ($app in $apps) {
Write-Host "Removing " -noNewLine; Write-Host $app -f white

# Need to hide the progress bar as otherwise it remains on the screen
$ProgressPreference="SilentlyContinue"

Get-AppxPackage -Name $app -AllUsers | Remove-AppxPackage

$ProgressPreference="Continue"

Get-AppXProvisionedPackage -Online |
where DisplayName -EQ $app |
Remove-AppxProvisionedPackage -Online

$appPath="$Env:LOCALAPPDATA\Packages\$app*"
Remove-Item $appPath -Recurse -Force -ErrorAction 0
}

 

This is something new. What does it do specifically? Is that complete?

 

It is all from the tutorial really.

As mentioned earlier in this thread Remove-AppxPackage removes for current user,
Remove-AppxProvisionedPackage removes it for new user and deleting from %localappdata%\Packages deletes any caches for the current user.

It certainly isn't complete. To be complete you would need to name all the apps you want to delete in the $apps array like this: PHP Code: $apps=
@(
"4DF9E0F8.Netflix"
"9E2F88E3.Twitter"
"A278AB0D.MarchofEmpires"
"ClearChannelRadioDigital.iHeartRadio"
"D52A8D61.FarmVille2CountryEscape"
"Facebook.Facebook"
"Flipboard.Flipboard"
"KeeperSecurityInc.Keeper"
"king.com.CandyCrushSaga"
"king.com.CandyCrushSodaSaga"
"king.com.ParadiseBay"
"HoloCamera"
"HoloItemPlayerApp"
"HoloShell"
"Microsoft.3DBuilder"
"Microsoft.Appconnector"
"Microsoft.BingFinance"
"Microsoft.BingNews"
"Microsoft.BingSports"
#"Microsoft.BingWeather"
"Microsoft.ConnectivityStore"
"Microsoft.CommsPhone"
"Microsoft.Getstarted"
"Microsoft.Messaging"
"Microsoft.Microsoft3DViewer"
"Microsoft.MicrosoftOfficeHub"
"Microsoft.MicrosoftSolitaireCollection"
"Microsoft.MicrosoftStickyNotes"
"Microsoft.MSPaint"
"Microsoft.Office.OneConnect"
#"Microsoft.Office.OneNote"
"Microsoft.Office.Sway"
"Microsoft.OneConnect"
"Microsoft.People"
"Microsoft.SkypeApp"
"Microsoft.Windows.Phone"
#"Microsoft.Windows.Photos"
"Microsoft.WindowsAlarms"
#"Microsoft.WindowsCalculator"
#"Microsoft.WindowsCamera"
#"Microsoft.WindowsFeedbackApp"
"Microsoft.WindowsMaps"
"Microsoft.WindowsPhone"
"Microsoft.WindowsSoundRecorder"
#"Microsoft.WindowsStore"
"Microsoft.XboxApp"
"Microsoft.XboxSpeechToTextOverlay"
"Microsoft.XboxGameOverlay"
"Microsoft.ZuneMusic"
"Microsoft.ZuneVideo"
#"microsoft.windowscommunicationsapps"
"Microsoft.MinecraftUWP"
"PandoraMediaInc.29680B314EFC2"
"SlingTVLLC.SlingTV"
"ShazamEntertainmentLtd.Shazam"
"Windows.MircastView"
)

Write-Host "Removing default apps" -f yellow
ForEach ($app in $apps) {
Write-Host "Removing " -noNewLine; Write-Host $app -f white

# Need to hide the progress bar as otherwise it remains on the screen
$ProgressPreference="SilentlyContinue"

Get-AppxPackage -Name $app -AllUsers | Remove-AppxPackage
$ProgressPreference="Continue"

Get-AppXProvisionedPackage -Online |
where DisplayName -EQ $app |
Remove-AppxProvisionedPackage -Online

$appPath="$Env:LOCALAPPDATA\Packages\$app*"
Remove-Item $appPath -Recurse -Force -ErrorAction 0
}

It was more a suggestion that you had 3 areas to (consider) deleting.

You could (I suppose) delete stuff from %localappdata% for other users but it would be complicated as you would have to take authority, save ACLs and restore authority back after.

It would probably be easier to just run it for each user than mess with their permissions. Also PowerShell will not let you delete apps for another user - there may be a workaround for multi-user PCs but I don't know it.