rm(P)                                                     rm(P)





NAME
       rm - remove directory entries

SYNOPSIS
       rm [-fiRr] file...

DESCRIPTION
       The  rm  utility shall remove the directory entry speci-
       fied by each file argument.

       If either of the files dot or dot-dot are  specified  as
       the  basename  portion of an operand (that is, the final
       pathname component), rm shall write a diagnostic message
       to  standard  error  and do nothing more with such oper-
       ands.

       For each file the following steps shall be taken:

       If the file does not exist: <ol type="a">

       If the -f option is not  specified,  rm  shall  write  a
       diagnostic message to standard error.

       Go on to any remaining files.

       If  file is of type directory, the following steps shall
       be taken: <ol type="a">

       If neither the -R option nor the -r option is specified,
       rm  shall  write a diagnostic message to standard error,
       do nothing more with file, and go on  to  any  remaining
       files.

       If  the  -f option is not specified, and either the per-
       missions of file do not permit writing and the  standard
       input  is  a  terminal or the -i option is specified, rm
       shall write a prompt to standard error and read  a  line
       from the standard input. If the response is not affirma-
       tive, rm shall do nothing more with the current file and
       go on to any remaining files.

       For each entry contained in file, other than dot or dot-
       dot, the four steps listed here (1 to 4) shall be  taken
       with  the  entry  as  if  it were a file operand. The rm
       utility shall not traverse directories by following sym-
       bolic links into other parts of the hierarchy, but shall
       remove the links themselves.

       If the -i option is specified, rm shall write  a  prompt
       to  standard  error  and  read  a line from the standard
       input.  If the response is not affirmative, rm shall  do
       nothing  more  with  the  current file, and go on to any
       remaining files.

       If file is not of type directory, the -f option  is  not
       specified,  and  either  the  permissions of file do not
       permit writing and the standard input is a  terminal  or
       the  -i  option is specified, rm shall write a prompt to
       the standard error and read a  line  from  the  standard
       input.  If  the response is not affirmative, rm shall do
       nothing more with the current file  and  go  on  to  any
       remaining files.

       If  the  current  file  is a directory, rm shall perform
       actions equivalent to the rmdir()  function  defined  in
       the  System  Interfaces  volume  of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001
       called with a pathname of the current file used  as  the
       path  argument.  If the current file is not a directory,
       rm shall perform  actions  equivalent  to  the  unlink()
       function  defined  in  the  System  Interfaces volume of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 called with a pathname of the  cur-
       rent file used as the path argument.

       If  this fails for any reason, rm shall write a diagnos-
       tic message to standard error, do nothing more with  the
       current file, and go on to any remaining files.

       The  rm  utility  shall  be able to descend to arbitrary
       depths in a file hierarchy, and shall not  fail  due  to
       path  length limitations (unless an operand specified by
       the user exceeds system limitations).

OPTIONS
       The rm utility shall conform  to  the  Base  Definitions
       volume  of  IEEE Std 1003.1-2001,  Section 12.2, Utility
       Syntax Guidelines.

       The following options shall be supported:

       -f     Do not prompt  for  confirmation.  Do  not  write
              diagnostic  messages or modify the exit status in
              the case of nonexistent operands.   Any  previous
              occurrences of the -i option shall be ignored.

       -i     Prompt  for confirmation as described previously.
              Any previous occurrences of the -f  option  shall
              be ignored.

       -R     Remove file hierarchies. See the DESCRIPTION.

       -r     Equivalent to -R.


OPERANDS
       The following operand shall be supported:

       file   A pathname of a directory entry to be removed.


STDIN
       The  standard  input shall be used to read an input line
       in response to each prompt specified in the STDOUT  sec-
       tion. Otherwise, the standard input shall not be used.

INPUT FILES
       None.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
       The  following  environment  variables  shall affect the
       execution of rm:

       LANG   Provide a default value for the internationaliza-
              tion  variables  that are unset or null. (See the
              Base Definitions volume of  IEEE Std 1003.1-2001,
              Section  8.2,  Internationalization Variables for
              the precedence of internationalization  variables
              used  to  determine  the  values  of locale cate-
              gories.)

       LC_ALL If set to a non-empty string value, override  the
              values  of  all  the  other  internationalization
              variables.

       LC_COLLATE

              Determine the locale for the behavior of  ranges,
              equivalence  classes, and multi-character collat-
              ing elements used in the extended regular expres-
              sion  defined  for  the yesexpr locale keyword in
              the LC_MESSAGES category.

       LC_CTYPE
              Determine the locale for  the  interpretation  of
              sequences  of  bytes  of  text data as characters
              (for example, single-byte as  opposed  to  multi-
              byte characters in arguments) and the behavior of
              character classes within regular expressions used
              in  the  extended  regular expression defined for
              the yesexpr locale  keyword  in  the  LC_MESSAGES
              category.

       LC_MESSAGES
              Determine the locale for the processing of affir-
              mative responses that should be  used  to  affect
              the  format  and  contents of diagnostic messages
              written to standard error.

       NLSPATH
              Determine the location of  message  catalogs  for
              the processing of LC_MESSAGES .


ASYNCHRONOUS EVENTS
       Default.

STDOUT
       Not used.

STDERR
       Prompts  shall  be  written  to standard error under the
       conditions specified in the DESCRIPTION and OPTIONS sec-
       tions.  The prompts shall contain the file pathname, but
       their format  is  otherwise  unspecified.  The  standard
       error also shall be used for diagnostic messages.

OUTPUT FILES
       None.

EXTENDED DESCRIPTION
       None.

EXIT STATUS
       The following exit values shall be returned:

        0     All  of  the named directory entries for which rm
              performed actions equivalent to  the  rmdir()  or
              unlink() functions were removed.

       >0     An error occurred.


CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS
       Default.

       The following sections are informative.

APPLICATION USAGE
       The  rm utility is forbidden to remove the names dot and
       dot-dot in order to avoid the consequences  of  inadver-
       tently doing something like:


              rm -r .*

       Some  implementations  do  not permit the removal of the
       last link to an executable binary  file  that  is  being
       executed; see the [EBUSY] error in the unlink() function
       defined   in   the   System   Interfaces    volume    of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001.  Thus,  the rm utility can fail to
       remove such files.

       The -i option causes rm to prompt and read the  standard
       input  even if the standard input is not a terminal, but
       in the absence of -i the mode prompting is not done when
       the standard input is not a terminal.

EXAMPLES
       The following command:


              rm a.out core

       removes the directory entries: a.out and core.

       The following command:


              rm -Rf junk

       removes the directory junk and all its contents, without
       prompting.

RATIONALE
       For absolute clarity, paragraphs (2b)  and  (3)  in  the
       DESCRIPTION of rm describing the behavior when prompting
       for confirmation, should be interpreted in the following
       manner:


              if ((NOT f_option) AND
                  ((not_writable AND input_is_terminal) OR i_option))

       The  exact format of the interactive prompts is unspeci-
       fied. Only the general nature of the contents of prompts
       are  specified  because  implementations may desire more
       descriptive prompts than those used on historical imple-
       mentations.  Therefore,  an application not using the -f
       option, or using the -i option, relies on the system  to
       provide the most suitable dialog directly with the user,
       based on the behavior specified.

       The -r option is historical practice on all  known  sys-
       tems.  The synonym -R option is provided for consistency
       with   the   other   utilities   in   this   volume   of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001  that  provide  options  requesting
       recursive descent through the file hierarchy.

       The behavior of the -f option in historical versions  of
       rm is inconsistent. In general, along with "forcing" the
       unlink  without  prompting  for  permission,  it  always
       causes diagnostic messages to be suppressed and the exit
       status to be unmodified  for  nonexistent  operands  and
       files  that  cannot  be unlinked. In some versions, how-
       ever, the -f option suppresses usage messages and system
       errors  as well. Suppressing such messages is not a ser-
       vice to either shell scripts or users.

       It is less clear that  error  messages  regarding  files
       that  cannot be unlinked (removed) should be suppressed.
       Although this is historical  practice,  this  volume  of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001  does  not  permit the -f option to
       suppress such messages.

       When given the -r and -i options, historical versions of
       rm prompt the user twice for each directory, once before
       removing its contents and once before actually  attempt-
       ing  to  delete  the directory entry that names it. This
       allows the user to "prune" the file hierarchy walk. His-
       torical  versions  of  rm were inconsistent in that some
       did not do the former prompt for  directories  named  on
       the command line and others had obscure prompting behav-
       ior when the -i option was specified and the permissions
       of  the file did not permit writing. The POSIX Shell and
       Utilities rm differs little from historic practice,  but
       does require that prompts be consistent. Historical ver-
       sions of rm were also inconsistent in that prompts  were
       done  to  both  standard output and standard error. This
       volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 requires that prompts  be
       done  to standard error, for consistency with cp and mv,
       and to allow historical extensions to rm that provide an
       option to list deleted files on standard output.

       The  rm  utility  is  required  to  descend to arbitrary
       depths so that any file hierarchy may be  deleted.  This
       means,  for  example, that the rm utility cannot run out
       of file descriptors during its descent (that is, if  the
       number  of  file  descriptors  is  limited, rm cannot be
       implemented in the historical  fashion  where  one  file
       descriptor is used per directory level). Also, rm is not
       permitted to fail because of path  length  restrictions,
       unless  an  operand specified by the user is longer than
       {PATH_MAX}.

       The rm utility removes symbolic  links  themselves,  not
       the  files they refer to, as a consequence of the depen-
       dence on the unlink() functionality,  per  the  DESCRIP-
       TION.  When removing hierarchies with -r or -R, the pro-
       hibition on following symbolic  links  has  to  be  made
       explicit.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       None.

SEE ALSO
       rmdir()    ,    the    System   Interfaces   volume   of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, remove(), rmdir(), unlink()

COPYRIGHT
       Portions of this text are reprinted  and  reproduced  in
       electronic  form  from  IEEE  Std  1003.1, 2003 Edition,
       Standard for Information Technology -- Portable  Operat-
       ing System Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base Speci-
       fications Issue 6, Copyright (C) 2001-2003 by the Insti-
       tute  of  Electrical  and Electronics Engineers, Inc and
       The Open Group. In the event of any discrepancy  between
       this  version  and  the original IEEE and The Open Group
       Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group  Standard
       is  the  referee  document. The original Standard can be
       obtained        online        at        http://www.open-
       group.org/unix/online.html .



POSIX                         2003                        rm(P)
