Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 09:47:36 +0200 (MET DST) From: grog@lemis.de (Greg Lehey) To: compland@ism.com.br (Helio Coelho Jr. - CompuLand Informatica) Cc: questions@FreeBSD.org (FreeBSD Questions) Subject: Re: Deleting a tree Message-ID: <199607090747.JAA09789@allegro.lemis.de> In-Reply-To: <199607081959.QAA28587@unix1.ism.com.br> from "Helio Coelho Jr. - CompuLand Informatica" at Jul 8, 96 04:59:24 pm
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Helio Coelho Jr. - CompuLand Informatica writes: > > Hi Greg: > > Sorry about the confusion. My question is: sometimes you want to > remove an application you installed. For example: /usr/local/sendmail. > I want to remove the sub-directory sendmail and all it's contents, without > going into sendmail, deleting the files and after going into all of the > subdirectories of sendmail, deleting all the files. I checked rmdir man > page and seems to me that you only can remove an EMPTY directory. If there is > a single file inside this directory, you have to go there, delete the file > first, step out, and then you can remove the directory. But it sometimes > is tedious. If the directory has 10 sub-directories inside it, you have to > remove one by one, by hand! I though of a script, that can recurse into the > directory you selected and remove the files inside it, and after remove the > directory itself. OK. You don't need a script. I gave you the answer for that: # rm -rf /usr/local/sendmail The -r option says "recursively descend into subdirectories and delete them". The -f option says "don't ask questions". > I know that, if you remove the directory only, the files will be there, > in the disk. I wonder if there's a script that can, recursively remove > all the contents of the directory you selected and any sub-directory it > might have, and after that remove the directory itself. (Like Deltree,in DOS). > >> >> Whichever it is, you haven't made your request clear. Do you make a >> distinction between archives and files? > > Yes. Sorry, this time I didn't make myself clear. *How* do you distinguish between archives and files? In UNIX, an archive is just a special kind of file. In this example, I still don't understand. Are you referring to the archives you used for installation, outside the trees you're deleting? Of course they won't be deleted. Greg
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