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48 .Dd July 3, 2017
49 .Dt RM 1
50 .Os
51 .Sh NAME
52 .Nm rm ,
53 .Nm rmdir
54 .Nd remove directory entries
55 .Sh SYNOPSIS
56 .Nm /usr/bin/rm
57 .Op Fl f
58 .Op Fl i
59 .Ar
60 .Pp
61 .Nm /usr/bin/rmdir
62 .Op Fl ps
63 .Ar dirname
64 .Ss "ksh93"
65 .Nm /usr/bin/rmdir
66 .Op Fl eps
67 .Ar dirname ...
68 .Sh DESCRIPTION
69 .Ss "/usr/bin/rm"
70 The
71 .Nm rm
72 utility removes the directory entry specified by each
73 .Ar file
74 argument.
75 If a file has no write permission and the standard input is a terminal, the
76 full set of permissions (in octal) for the file are printed followed by a
77 question mark.
78 This is a prompt for confirmation.
79 If the answer is affirmative, the file is deleted, otherwise the file remains.
80 .Pp
81 If
82 .Ar file
83 is a symbolic link, the link is removed, but the file or directory to which it
84 refers is not deleted.
85 Users do not need write permission to remove a symbolic link, provided they
86 have write permissions in the directory.
87 .Pp
88 If multiple
89 .Ar file Ns s
90 are specified and removal of a
91 .Ar file
92 fails for any reason,
93 .Nm rm
94 writes a diagnostic message to standard error, do nothing more to the current
95 .Ar file ,
96 and go on to any remaining
97 .Ar file Ns s .
98 .Pp
99 If the standard input is not a terminal, the utility operates as if the
100 .Fl f
101 option is in effect.
102 .Ss "/usr/bin/rmdir"
103 The
104 .Nm rmdir
105 utility removes the directory entry specified by each
106 .Ar dirname
107 operand, which must refer to an empty directory.
108 .Pp
109 Directories are processed in the order specified.
110 If a directory and a subdirectory of that directory are specified in a single
111 invocation of
112 .Nm rmdir ,
113 the subdirectory must be specified before the parent directory so that the
114 parent directory is empty when
115 .Nm rmdir
116 tries to remove it.
117 .Ss "ksh93"
118 The
119 .Nm rmdir
120 built-in in
121 .Nm ksh93
122 is associated with the
123 .Pa /bin
124 and
125 .Pa /usr/bin
126 paths.
127 It is invoked when
128 .Nm rmdir
129 is executed without a pathname prefix and the pathname search finds a
130 .Pa /bin/rmdir
131 or
132 .Pa /usr/bin/rmdir
133 executable.
134 .Pp
135 .Nm rmdir
136 deletes each given directory.
137 The directory must be empty and contain no entries other than
138 .Pa \&.
139 or
140 .Pa .. .
141 If a directory and a
142 subdirectory of that directory are specified as operands, the subdirectory must
143 be specified before the parent, so that the parent directory is empty when
144 .Nm rmdir
145 attempts to remove it.
146 .Sh OPTIONS
147 The following options are supported for
148 .Nm /usr/bin/rm
149 .Bl -hang
150 .It Fl r
151 Recursively removes directories and subdirectories in the argument list.
152 The directory is emptied of files and removed.
153 The user is normally prompted for removal of any write-protected files which
154 the directory contains.
155 The write-protected files are removed without prompting, however, if the
156 .Fl f
157 option is used, or if the standard input is not a terminal and the
158 .Fl i
159 option is not used.
160 .Pp
161 Symbolic links that are encountered with this option is not traversed.
162 .Pp
163 If the removal of a non-empty, write-protected directory is attempted, the
164 utility always fails (even if the
165 .Fl f
166 option is used), resulting in an error message.
167 .It Fl R
168 Same as
169 .Fl r
170 option.
171 .El
172 .Ss "/usr/bin/rm"
173 The following options are supported for
174 .Nm /usr/bin/rm
175 only:
176 .Bl -hang
177 .It Fl f
178 Removes all files (whether write-protected or not) in a directory without
179 prompting the user.
180 In a write-protected directory, however, files are never removed (whatever
181 their permissions are), but no messages are displayed.
182 If the removal of a write-protected directory is attempted, this option does
183 not suppress an error message.
184 .It Fl i
185 Interactive.
186 With this option,
187 .Nm rm
188 prompts for confirmation before
189 removing any files.
190 It overrides the
191 .Fl f
192 option and remains in effect even if the standard input is not a terminal.
193 .El
194 .Ss "/usr/bin/rmdir"
195 The following options are supported for
196 .Nm /usr/bin/rmdir
197 only:
198 .Bl -hang
199 .It Fl p
200 Allows users to remove the directory
201 .Ar dirname
202 and its parent directories which become empty.
203 A message is printed to standard error if all or part of the path could not be
204 removed.
205 .It Fl s
206 Suppresses the message printed on the standard error when
207 .Fl p
208 is in effect.
209 .El
210 .Ss "ksh93"
211 The following options are supported for the
212 .Nm rmdir
213 built-in for
214 .Nm ksh93 :
215 .Pp
216 .Bl -hang -compact
217 .It Fl e
218 .It Fl -ignore-fail-on-non-empty
219 Ignore each non-empty directory failure.
220 .El
221 .Pp
222 .Bl -hang -compact
223 .It Fl p
224 .It Fl -parents
225 Remove each explicit directory argument directory that becomes empty after its
226 child directories are removed.
227 .El
228 .Pp
229 .Bl -hang -compact
230 .It Fl s
231 .It Fl -suppress
232 Suppress the message printed on the standard error when
233 .Fl p
234 is in effect.
235 .El
236 .Sh OPERANDS
237 The following operands are supported:
238 .Bl -tag -width Ar
239 .It Ar file
240 Specifies the pathname of a directory entry to be removed.
241 .It Ar dirname
242 Specifies the pathname of an empty directory to be removed.
243 .El
244 .Sh USAGE
245 See
246 .Xr largefile 5
247 for the description of the behavior of
248 .Nm rm
249 and
250 .Nm rmdir
251 when encountering files greater than or equal to 2 Gbyte (2^31 bytes).
252 .Sh EXIT STATUS
253 The following exit values are returned:
254 .Bl -tag -width Sy
255 .It Sy 0
256 If the
257 .Fl f
258 option was not specified, all the named directory entries were
259 removed; otherwise, all the existing named directory entries were removed.
260 .It Sy >0
261 An error occurred.
262 .El
263 .Ss "ksh93"
264 The following exit values are returned:
265 .Bl -tag -width Sy
266 .It Sy 0
267 Successful completion.
268 All directories deleted successfully.
269 .It Sy >0
270 An error occurred.
271 One or more directories could not be deleted.
272 .El
273 .Sh EXAMPLES
274 The following examples are valid for the commands shown.
275 .Ss "/usr/bin/rm"
276 .Bl -ohang
277 .It Sy Example 1 No Removing Directories
278 .Pp
279 The following command removes the directory entries
280 .Pa a.out
281 and
282 .Pa core :
283 .Pp
284 .Dl example% rm a.out core
285 .El
286 .Bl -ohang
287 .It Sy Example 2 No Removing a Directory without Prompting
288 .Pp
289 The following command removes the directory
290 .Pa junk
291 and all its contents, without prompting:
292 .Pp
293 .Dl example% rm -rf junk
294 .El
295 .Ss "/usr/bin/rmdir"
296 .Bl -ohang
297 .It Sy Example 3 No Removing Empty Directories
298 .Pp
299 If a directory
300 .Pa a
301 in the current directory is empty, except that it contains a directory
302 .Pa b ,
303 and
304 .Pa a/b
305 is empty except that it contains a directory
306 .Pa c ,
307 the following command removes all three directories:
308 .Pp
309 .Dl example% rmdir -p a/b/c
310 .El
311 .Sh DIAGNOSTICS
312 All messages are generally self-explanatory.
313 .Pp
314 It is forbidden to remove the files
315 .Qq Pa \&.
316 and
317 .Qq Pa ..
318 in order to
319 avoid the consequences of inadvertently doing something like the following:
320 .Pp
321 .Dl example% rm -r .*
322 .Pp
323 It is forbidden to remove the file
324 .Qq Pa /
325 in order to avoid the consequences of inadvertently doing something like:
326 .Pp
327 .Dl example% rm -rf $x/$y
328 .Pp
329 or
330 .Pp
331 .Dl example% rm -rf /$y
332 .Pp
333 when
334 .Va $x
335 and
336 .Va $y
337 expand to empty strings.
338 .Sh ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
339 See
340 .Xr environ 5
341 for descriptions of the following environment variables that affect the
342 execution of
343 .Nm rm
344 and
345 .Nm rmdir :
346 .Ev LANG ,
347 .Ev LC_ALL ,
348 .Ev LC_COLLATE ,
349 .Ev LC_CTYPE ,
350 .Ev LC_MESSAGES ,
351 and
352 .Ev NLSPATH .
353 .Pp
354 Affirmative responses are processed using the extended regular expression
355 defined for the
356 .Sy yesexpr
357 keyword in the
358 .Ev LC_MESSAGES
359 category of the
360 user's locale.
361 The locale specified in the
362 .Ev LC_COLLATE
363 category defines
364 the behavior of ranges, equivalence classes, and multi-character collating
365 elements used in the expression defined for
366 .Sy yesexpr .
367 The locale specified in
368 .Ev LC_CTYPE
369 determines the locale for interpretation of sequences of
370 bytes of text data a characters, the behavior of character classes used in the
371 expression defined for the
372 .Sy yesexpr .
373 See
374 .Xr locale 5 .
375 .Sh INTERFACE STABILITY
376 .Ss "ksh93"
377 The
378 .Nm ksh93
379 built-in binding to
380 .Pa /bin
381 and
382 .Pa /usr/bin
383 is Volatile.
384 The built-in interfaces are Uncommitted.
385 .Sh SEE ALSO
386 .Xr ksh93 1 ,
387 .Xr rmdir 2 ,
388 .Xr rmdir 2 ,
389 .Xr unlink 2 ,
390 .Xr attributes 5 ,
391 .Xr environ 5 ,
392 .Xr largefile 5 ,
393 .Xr standards 5
394 .Sh NOTES
395 A
396 .Fl
397 permits the user to mark explicitly the end of any command line options,
398 allowing
399 .Nm rm
400 to recognize file arguments that begin with a
401 .Fl .
402 As an aid to BSD migration,
403 .Nm rm
404 accepts
405 .Fl -
406 as a synonym for
407 .Fl .
408 This migration aid may disappear in a future release.
409 If a
410 .Fl -
411 and a
412 .Fl
413 both appear on the same command line, the second is interpreted as a file.