rmdir(P)                                               rmdir(P)





NAME
       rmdir - remove directories

SYNOPSIS
       rmdir [-p] dir...

DESCRIPTION
       The rmdir utility shall remove the directory entry spec-
       ified by each dir operand.

       For each dir operand, the rmdir  utility  shall  perform
       actions  equivalent  to the rmdir() function called with
       the dir operand as its only argument.

       Directories shall be processed in the  order  specified.
       If  a directory and a subdirectory of that directory are
       specified in a single invocation of the  rmdir  utility,
       the  application  shall  specify the subdirectory before
       the parent directory so that the parent  directory  will
       be empty when the rmdir utility tries to remove it.

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

       The following option shall be supported:

       -p     Remove  all  directories  in a pathname. For each
              dir operand:

       The directory entry it names shall be removed.

       If the dir operand includes more than one pathname  com-
       ponent,  effects  equivalent  to  the  following command
       shall occur:


              rmdir -p $(dirname dir)


OPERANDS
       The following operand shall be supported:

       dir    A pathname of an empty directory to be removed.


STDIN
       Not used.

INPUT FILES
       None.

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

       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_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).

       LC_MESSAGES
              Determine the  locale  that  should  be  used  to
              affect the format and contents of diagnostic mes-
              sages written to standard error.

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


ASYNCHRONOUS EVENTS
       Default.

STDOUT
       Not used.

STDERR
       The  standard  error  shall  be used only for diagnostic
       messages.

OUTPUT FILES
       None.

EXTENDED DESCRIPTION
       None.

EXIT STATUS
       The following exit values shall be returned:

        0     Each directory entry specified by a  dir  operand
              was removed successfully.

       >0     An error occurred.


CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS
       Default.

       The following sections are informative.

APPLICATION USAGE
       The  definition  of  an empty directory is one that con-
       tains, at most, directory entries for dot and dot-dot.

EXAMPLES
       If a directory a  in  the  current  directory  is  empty
       except it contains a directory b and a/b is empty except
       it contains a directory c:


              rmdir -p a/b/c

       removes all three directories.

RATIONALE
       On historical System  V  systems,  the  -p  option  also
       caused  a  message to be written to the standard output.
       The message indicated whether the whole path was removed
       or  whether  part  of the path remained for some reason.
       The STDERR section requires  this  diagnostic  when  the
       entire  path  specified by a dir operand is not removed,
       but does not allow the status message reporting  success
       to be written as a diagnostic.

       The  rmdir utility on System V also included a -s option
       that suppressed the informational message output by  the
       -p  option.  This  option  has  been omitted because the
       informational message is not specified by this volume of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       None.

SEE ALSO
       rm     ,     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                     rmdir(P)
