V6 Clean install (after running nighties) - Howto?

Software
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Hi
Running Windows 10.

After using a later nightly 5.99 version, what is the preferred method to do a nice fresh clean install of the ‘proper’ v6 release version?

thanks

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  1. Install the latest 6.0 stable release. No need to uninstall 5.99 first, but you can uninstall 5.99 at any point.
  2. When you start it, decide whether to import your settings from 5.99 or start with defaults.
  3. Library configurations aren’t imported from a previous version. If you added any custom global libraries, you’ll need to add them again. Launch the footprint editor / symbol editor once, and you’ll be asked how to set up the global library tables. Choose the default option of copying the default global library table. Then, go to Manage Symbol Libraries / Manage Footprint Libraries and add back your custom libraries (if you have them).
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KiCad does (At least on Linux) keep a directory for configuration files (On Linux: ~/.config/kicad/ and a directory for shared content (On Linux: ~/.local/share/kicad) and these are left behind after an un-install

So if you want to do a “clean” install for some reason, then delete or rename these (or your equivalent) directories. For normal operations it should not be needed to do so, but neither humans nor computers are perfect.

You could also do a searc for “kicad” through your file system (and the registry?).
For me, that would give loads of false positives, from project I collected from the internet, my own projects, and the complete source code of the KiCad documentation, which I’m still planning to work on…

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Hello @Docara
Make sure you do as this dude advises @craftyjon … he knows stuff.
With windows, installing 6.0.1 is independent of 5.99.
6.0.1 will install along side 5.1.x or over 5.1.x. or if there is no 5.1.anything it will just clean install.
If you decide to install 6.99, that will be able to override 5.99

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Great thanks for the replies.

So if you want to do a “clean” install for some reason,

The reason is that after messing around with 5.0.x for a while and then using the 6 nightlies I made mistakes with configurations, library locations, hang over settings etc etc I have multiple versions of Kicad floating around.
As I feel Kicad is now much more useable piece of software and now that v6 has landed I want to start using it properly going forward without any c**p affecting the setup/configuration.

Lastly, can some of my newer nightly designs be opened in (public release) v6? Has there been any major file structure changes which would screw any files created from approx 6months ago using a nightly version.

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6 will open anything in 5 or 5.99. You just can’t open anything in 5 after it has been converted to 6.

Don’t forget you will still have to reload your personal libraries.
And ABSOLUTELY don’t forget:

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