Ajeh:
In the bottom of the Option Names is the feature for:
This allows you to pick 1 Category at a time and remove all attributes that are on it ...
But I cannot recall if that is in the ancient version that you are using ...
Or, you can go to each Category that is bad and set one product to the right attributes and copy those attributes to all products in 1 category and delete the old ones ... based on the premis that each Category is using the same attributes ...
Thanks, the option to delete all attributes on the chosen category was there. -Even in this ancient version ;-) So that actually gets rid of all the attributes for me.
And your premis that each Category uses the same attributes are very unfortunately wrong, hehe. But I think this is the kick in the ######## I need to stop using attributes and convert to separate products for a whole bunch of items. My last straw is the option of using phpMyAdmin to import the old attributes back where they belong, but I am not sure if this is even possible. The table products_attributes is surely involved, but there could easily be more. I dare not dive into that without guidance.