How to uninstall postgresql on my Mac (running Snow Leopard)

Question

Upgraded 10.6 from 10.5 and now postgres 8.1 is whacked. To make things worse I tried installing 8.4 which I'm pretty sure just made things ten times worse. Anyhow, the exception I'm getting when I try to fire postgres up and just createuser is this:

createuser: could not connect to database postgres: could not connect to server: No such file or directory Is the server running locally and accepting connections on Unix domain socket "/tmp/.s.PGSQL.5432"?

HOW do I fully get rid of postgres on my Mac so I can do a do-over?

Thanks

Answer 1

The problem was with the PostgreSQL account sitting on my machine.

I removed the account and proceeded with the uninstall using the instructions here:

Automatic Uninstall:

In the installation directory, there will be a uninstall-postgresql.app file. Executing (double clicking) that will uninstall the PostgreSQL installation.

Manual Uninstall:

1. Stop the server:

   sudo /sbin/SystemStarter stop postgresql-8.3 

2. Remove menu shortcuts:

   sudo rm -rf /Applications/PostgreSQL 8.3 

3. Remove the ini file:

   sudo rm -rf /etc/postgres-reg.ini 

4. Removing Startup Items:

   sudo rm -rf /Library/StartupItems/postgresql-8.3 

5. Remove the data and installed files:

   sudo rm -rf /Library/PostgreSQL/8.3 

6. Delete the user postgres:

   sudo dscl . delete /users/postgres  

Answer 2

I can add this tiny command to the answer too:

rm /usr/bin/psql 

Remove executable psql alias.