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RM(1)			  BSD General Commands Manual			 RM(1)

NAME
     rm, unlink — remove directory entries

SYNOPSIS
     rm [-f | -i] [-dIPRrvW] file ...
     unlink file

DESCRIPTION
     The rm utility attempts to remove the non-directory type files specified
     on the command line.  If the permissions of the file do not permit writ‐
     ing, 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
	     exist, do not display a diagnostic message or modify the exit
	     status to reflect an error.  The -f option overrides any previous
	     -i options.

     -i	     Request confirmation before attempting to remove each file,
	     regardless 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.

     -I	     Request confirmation once if more than three files are being
	     removed or if a directory is being recursively removed.  This is
	     a far less intrusive option than -i yet provides almost the same
	     level of protection against mistakes.

     -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.  Files with multi‐
	     ple links will not be overwritten nor deleted unless -f is speci‐
	     fied, a warning is generated instead.

	     Specifying this flag for a read only file will cause rm to gener‐
	     ate an error message and exit.  The file will not be removed or
	     overwritten.

     -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
	     directory'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.

     -v	     Be verbose when deleting files, showing them as they are removed.

     -W	     Attempt to undelete the named files.  Currently, this option can
	     only be used to recover files covered by whiteouts in a union
	     file system (see undelete(2)).

     The rm utility removes symbolic links, not the files referenced by the
     links.

     It is an error to attempt to remove the files /, . or ...

     When the utility is called as unlink, only one argument, which must not
     be a directory, may be supplied.  No options may be supplied in this sim‐
     ple mode of operation, which performs an unlink(2) operation on the
     passed argument.

EXIT STATUS
     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.

NOTES
     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
     options 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

     When -P is specified with -f the file will be overwritten and removed
     even if it has hard links.

COMPATIBILITY
     The rm utility differs from historical implementations in that the -f
     option only masks attempts to remove non-existent files instead of mask‐
     ing a large variety of errors.  The -v option is non-standard and its use
     in scripts is not recommended.

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

SEE ALSO
     chflags(1), rmdir(1), undelete(2), unlink(2), fts(3), getopt(3),
     symlink(7)

STANDARDS
     The rm command conforms to IEEE Std 1003.2 (“POSIX.2”).

     The simplified unlink command conforms to Version 2 of the Single UNIX
     Specification (“SUSv2”).

HISTORY
     A rm command appeared in Version 1 AT&T UNIX.

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

BSD			       December 26, 2006			   BSD
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