rm

rm: remove files and directories.

Synopsis

rm [-r] [-f] path…

Description

rm removes each file named. A symbolic link is removed itself, never what it points to. A directory is removed only with -r.

Options

Options may be combined (-rf) and may come anywhere among the paths.

-r -R

Remove directories and everything in them. Links inside are removed, never followed.

-f

Say nothing about paths that do not exist.

Exit status

0 if everything named was removed (or, with -f, was not there); 1 otherwise, or for an unknown option.

Notes

Any other option letter is refused (status 1, nothing removed). Any word starting with - is taken as options, so a file whose name starts with - must be named as ./-name. There is no -i (no prompting).

See also

rmdir(1), mv(1), find(1)