rm, rmdir - remove (unlink) files or directories

---

SYNOPSIS

rmdir directory...

DESCRIPTION

rm removes (directory entries for) one or more files. If an entry was the last link to the file, the contents of that file are lost. See ln.1v for more information about multiple links to files.

To remove a file, you must have write permission in its directory; but you do not need read or write permission on the file itself. If you do not have write permission on the file and the standard input is a terminal, rm displays the file's permissions and waits for you to type in a response. If your response begins with y the file is deleted; otherwise the file is left alone.

rmdir removes each named directory. rmdir only removes empty directories.

OPTIONS

-

Treat the following arguments as filenames `-' so that you can specify filenames starting with a minus.

-f

Force files to be removed without displaying permissions, asking questions or reporting errors.

-i

Ask whether to delete each file, and, under -r, whether to examine each directory. Sometimes called the interactive option.

-r

Recursively delete the contents of a directory, its subdirectories, and the directory itself.

SEE ALSO

BUGS

`rm -r' removes a directory and its files only if your real user ID has write permission on that directory.

DIAGNOSTICS

rm: filename: No such file or directory

filename does not exist. rm will also return false (1) if filename was not found.

WARNING

It is forbidden to remove the file `..' to avoid the antisocial consequences of inadvertently doing something like `rm -r .*'.

Created by unroff & hp-tools. © somebody (See intro for details). All Rights Reserved. Last modified 11/5/97