Can't Remove a Directory in Unix

Can't remove a directory in Unix

Try to delete it with root user or use sudo, if you are in trouble

Use rm -rf dir with root account and it will be deleted, since you should be facing a permissions issue.

Linux rm can't remove files

If your shell is bash, you can use printf '%q\n' * to list filenames in shell-quoted form. This will provide the names formatted in such a way that you can pass them to rm exactly as given.

In Unix, how do you remove everything in the current directory and below it?

Practice safe computing. Simply go up one level in the hierarchy and don't use a wildcard expression:

cd ..; rm -rf -- <dir-to-remove>

The two dashes -- tell rm that <dir-to-remove> is not a command-line option, even when it begins with a dash.

check if directory exists and delete in one command unix

Assuming $WORKING_DIR is set to the directory... this one-liner should do it:

if [ -d "$WORKING_DIR" ]; then rm -Rf $WORKING_DIR; fi

(otherwise just replace with your directory)

What permissions are needed to delete a file in unix?

You actually need read, write and execute permissions on the directory, not on the file itself since the operation is done considering the permissions effects of directories.

A good documentation can be found on this link, which mentions the below in the section Special Considerations on Directories:

To delete a file requires both write (to modify the directory itself)
and execute (to stat() the file's inode) on a directory.  Note a user
needs no permissions on a file nor be the file's owner to delete it!

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