RM(1)                      Commands and Applications                     RM(1)

NAME

       rm - remove directory entries

SYNOPSIS

       rm [-f|-i] [-dPRr] file...

DESCRIPTION

       The  rm  utility attempts to remove the non-directory type files speci‐
       fied on the command line.  If the permissions of the file do not permit
       writing,  and  the  standard  input  device  is a terminal, the user is
       prompted (on the standard error output) for confirmation.

       The options are as follows:

       -d     Attempt to remove directories as well as other types of files.

       -f     Attempt to remove the files without prompting for  confirmation,
              regardless  of the file's permissions.  If the file does not ex‐
              ist, do not display a diagnostic message or modify the exit sta‐
              tus  to  reflect an error.  The -f option overrides any previous
              -i options.

       -i     Request confirmation before attempting to remove each file,  re‐
              gardless  of the file's permissions, or whether or not the stan‐
              dard input device is a terminal.  The -i  option  overrides  any
              previous -f options.

       -P     Overwrite  regular  files before deleting them.  Files are over‐
              written three times, first with  the  byte  pattern  0xff,  then
              0x00, and then 0xff again, before they are deleted.

       -R     Attempt  to  remove the file hierarchy rooted in each file argu‐
              ment.  The -R option implies the -d option.  If the -i option is
              specified, the user is prompted for confirmation before each di‐
              rectory's contents are processed (as well as before the  attempt
              is  made to remove the directory).  If the user does not respond
              affirmatively, the file hierarchy rooted in  that  directory  is
              skipped.

       -r     Equivalent to -R.

       It is an error to attempt to remove the files ``.'' and ``..''.

       The  rm  utility  exits 0 if all of the named files or file hierarchies
       were removed, or if the -f option was specified and all of the existing
       files  or  file hierarchies were removed.  If an error occurs, rm exits
       with a value >0.

NOTE

       The rm command uses getopt(3) to parse its arguments, which  allows  it
       to accept the -- option which will cause it to stop processing flag op‐
       tions at that point.  This will allow the removal of  file  names  that
       begin with a dash (-).  For example:
              rm -- -filename
       The same behavior can be obtained by using an absolute or relative path
       reference.  For example:
              rm /home/user/-filename
              rm ./-filename
       This is useful for commands that do not use getopt(3) to parse the com‐
       mand line arguments.

SEE ALSO

       rmdir(1), unlink(2), fts(3), getopt(3)

BUGS

       The  -P option assumes that the underlying file system is a fixed-block
       file system.  In addition, only regular files  are  overwritten,  other
       types of files are not.

COMPATIBILITY

       The  rm  utility differs from historical implementations in that the -f
       option only masks attempts to  remove  non-existent  files  instead  of
       masking a large variety of errors.

       Also,  historical  implementations prompted on the standard output, not
       the standard error output.

STANDARDS

       The rm command is expected to be POSIX-2 compatible.

VERSION

       This manual page documents GNO rm version 1.0.

ATTRIBUTIONS

       This command was ported from FreeBSD source code for distribution  with
       GNO/ME 2.0.6.

HISTORY

       This  is  the first version of rm to be released with GNO.  Previously,
       the file removal function was accomplished via an option to the cp com‐
       mand.




GNO                                May 1999                              RM(1)