Northern Illinois University
Information Technology Services
Date Last Reviewed:03/01/2007
VPN Client Removal on Mac OS
Unlike most other Mac OS X applications, uninstalling the Cisco VPN Client is a bit more involved than simply dragging its icon to the Trash. Uninstalling the client requires the user to run a command-line utility which removes the library files that the client depends on to function. These instructions describe a procedure for completely removing the Cisco VPN Client from a Macintosh system.
Step 1. Start Terminal.app
In order to run the command-line utility that will remove the VPN client and all of its required libraries, we will need to access the command-line. In Mac OS X,this access is provided by an application called Terminal.app. You can find this application in the Utilities folder under Applications. Double-click its icon to start Terminal.app.
When Terminal.app starts, you will be presented with a login prompt similar to the following:
This is the command-line (also known as the shell). From here, you have access to much of the same functionality as you have within the Finder. In this case, we're only interested in executing the vpn_uninstall utility, which is installed automatically along with the VPN client itself.
Step 2. Run the vpn_uninstall utility
Type the following at the '$' prompt in Terminal.app and press the Return key:
sudo /usr/local/bin/vpn_uninstall
You may be prompted for a password at this point. If this is your personal machine, just enter your account password, and continue with Step 3. If this is not your machine, and your account has not been set up with appropriate access, you will see the message "Sorry, try again." followed again by a password prompt. If you see this, either your password was typed incorrectly, or your account does not have the appropriate access. If your account does not have the appropriate access, you will need either to contact your LAN Administrator (for faculty and staff computers) or someone with an Administrator account on the computer (for student computers) in order to proceed.
Note: When Mac OS X is first installed, the first account created on the system will, by default, be an Administrator account. Administrator accounts have the ability to install and remove applications, as well as make other low-level changes to the system.
Step 3. Follow the prompts
From here on, the uninstall utility takes over. You will be prompted through the rest of the process. For reference, a walk-through is provided below.
vpn_uninstall utility walk-through
Type the following at the '$' prompt in Terminal.app and press the Return key:
sudo /usr/local/bin/vpn_uninstall
Before running the vpn_uninstall utility, you may be prompted to provide a password. Enter your password and press Return. Administrator permissions are required to continue beyond this point (see above for instructions). By default the first account created on the computer will have the appropriate permissions.
After entering the Administrator password, the vpn_uninstall utility will start. The utility will prompt you for confirmation and any additional information it may need.
The first prompt asks you to confirm that you do, indeed, wish to remove the client. Press Return to accept the default response (no, in this case) or type a response and press Return. Accepting the default response to this first prompt will exit the utility. The Cisco VPN client will not be removed. You probably want to type yes at this point.
The second, and final, prompt askes if you wish to remove the connection profiles that were installed with the client. The connection profiles configure the VPN client to connect to the NIU network. Type yes to remove these as well.
Note: Although it is possible to answer no at this point, it is not recommended. The recommended procedure is to remove everything, and then reinstall if necessary.
After responding to this final prompt, the utility will remove the Cisco VPN client from the system. The utility prints a number of status messages that report its progress.
After the utility is finished, you will be returned to the shell prompt. You may close the Terminal.app window by clicking the red button in the upper left-hand corner of the window.
At this point, the Cisco VPN client has been completely removed. If you removed the client in the course of troubleshooting, you may reinstall the client now.