PowerShell PackageManagement, how to uninstall a package provider?

Question

To troubleshoot a problem, I thought I'd try reinstalling the Chocolatey package provider. There appears to be no cmdlet to remove or uninstall a package provider. I'm not referring to removing a package source or package. I'm using PowerShell 5 on Windows 10.

Is there a way to uninstall a package provider?

Answer 1

A simple example of how to remove NuGet provider

(Get-PackageProvider|where-object{$_.name -eq "nuget"}).ProviderPath|Remove-Item -force
Restart-Computer

Answer 2

To complement Harald F's helpful answer, given that the PackageManagement module as of version 1.4.7 still has no Uninstall-PackageProvider command (see all commands that come with the module with Get-Command -Module PackageManagement):

Note: To be able to undo this change later, make a note of the path reported by (Get-PackageProvider NuGet).ProviderPath and make a backup copy of that file.

Step-by-step instructions for removing the NuGet package provider, for example:

• On Windows:

  • Copy the path of the NuGet package-provider assembly (DLL) to the clipboard:

    • (Get-PackageProvider NuGet).ProviderPath | Set-Clipboard

  • Start an elevated PowerShell session (run as admin - requires administrator credentials). To do that from an existing (non-elevated) session, run:

    • Start-Process -Verb RunAs (Get-Process -Id $PID).Path

  • Before continuing, close all other PowerShell sessions, which may include needing to exit Visual Studio Code.

    • Deleting the DLL will only succeed if no session has it currently loaded; if that isn't ensured, you'll get an Access denied error, even with elevation.

  • In the elevated session (in which you must not have submitted any PackageManagement commands), submit the following command to delete the NuGet package-provider assembly (DLL):

    • Remove-Item -Force <paste-the-previously-copied-path-here>

• On macOS and Linux:

  • Start a PowerShell session with sudo. To do that from an existing (non-elevated) session, run:

    • sudo pwsh

  • Submit the following command to delete the NuGet package-provider assembly (DLL):

    • (Get-PackageProvider NuGet).ProviderPath | Remove-Item -Force

• The remaining steps apply to all platforms:

  • Exit the elevated / sudo session.

  • Start a new (non-elevated) session for the change to take effect: Get-PackageProvider should then no longer list the NuGet provider.

Answer 3

If I understand what you want :

Uninstall-Package [-Id] [-RemoveDependencies] [-ProjectName ] [-Force] [-Version ] [-WhatIf]

Use the -Force option to forces a package to be uninstalled.