UNLINK(2)UNLINK(2)NAMEunlink - remove directory entry
SYNOPSIS
int unlink(const char *path);
DESCRIPTION
The unlink function removes the link whose pathname is specified by
path and decrement the link count of the file referenced by the link.
If this entry was the last link to the file, and no process has the
file open, then all resources associated with the file are reclaimed.
If, however, the file was open in any process, the actual resource
reclamation is delayed until it is closed, even though the directory
entry has disappeared.
The path argument must not name a directory. Applications should use
rmdir to remove a directory.
Upon successful completion, the unlink function marks for update the
st_ctime and st_mtime fields of the parent directory of the entry to be
removed. Furthermore, if the link count of the file is not zero, then
the st_ctime field of the file is also marked for update.
RETURN VALUE
Upon successful completion, a value of zero is returned. Otherwise, a
value of -1 is returned and errno is set to indicate the error.
ERRORS
If any of the following conditions occurs, the unlink function returns
-1 and sets errno to the corresponding value:
[EACCES] Search permission is denied for a component of the path
prefix.
[EACCES] Write permission is denied on the directory containing
the link to be removed.
[EBUSY] The entry to be unlinked is the mount point for a
mounted file system.
[EFAULT] The path argument points outside the process's allocated
address space.
[EINVAL] The pathname contains a character with the high-order
bit set.
[EIO] An I/O error occurred while deleting the directory entry
or deallocating the inode.
[ELOOP] Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating
the pathname.
[ENAMETOOLONG] A component of path exceeds 255 characters, or the
entire pathname exceeds 1023 characters. For POSIX
applications these values are given by the constants
{NAME_MAX} and {PATH_MAX}, respectively.
[ENOENT] The named file does not exist.
[ENOENT] The path argument points to an empty string.
[ENOTDIR] A component of the path prefix is not a directory.
[EPERM] The named file is a directory.
[EPERM] The directory containing the file is marked sticky, and
neither the containing directory nor the file to be
removed are owned by the effective user ID.
[EROFS] The named file resides on a read-only file system.
SEE ALSOclose(2), link(2), open(2), rename(2), rmdir(2)4th Berkeley Distribution August 1, 1992 UNLINK(2)
