[SOLVED] rm -rf vs rm -r

Jalfor · 07-12-2012, 07:16 AM

Just a simple question which I can't work out. Why, when people are deleting folders, do people always do it using rm -rf? I have done a few tests and rm -r always does it perfectly well.

According to rm --help, the 'f' option makes rm "ignore nonexistent files, never prompt". I assume by "nonexistent" it is referring to '.' and "..", but these seem to be removed automatically by rm -r.

Thanks for any information. I'm just curious.

zhjim · 07-12-2012, 07:24 AM

There are some distributions that even ask you if your sure to remove a directory also the -r option is given. Namely redhat and centos. Dunno of any other distro though.

knudfl · 07-12-2012, 07:30 AM

'rm -r' works in Debian based OS like Mint and Ubuntu.
Works too in Slackware.

In RHEL, CentOS, Mandriva, PCLinuxOS you will have to say 'yes'
for every single file in a folder, if 'rm -r' is used.
Hence 'rm -rf'.

.

Jalfor · 07-12-2012, 07:34 AM

Ah, makes sense now. Thanks

linuxcoder · 07-14-2012, 11:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by knudfl

In RHEL, CentOS, Mandriva, PCLinuxOS you will have to say 'yes'
for every single file in a folder, if 'rm -r' is used.
Hence 'rm -rf'..

Is that because it's part of the system as a default or is it because "rm" gets aliased to "rm -i". I've seen a good number of systems that either do the alias trick or have rm move the file(s) to a .trash folder. Getting around either is fairly straightforward. Personally, I hate people having to rely on such tricks as it gives a false sense of security when they happen to be on a system that doesn't offer those same safeguards.

zhjim · 07-16-2012, 02:36 AM

Checked it on Centos-6.3. There is an alias for rm to rm -i like you sad. And I totaly agree with you on the false sense.
Just for me to be sure I always first do a ls ./your_files_to*_delete and if the output only consists of files that I am sure about I arrow-up inside the history, ctrl-a to start of line, ctrl-d to erase ls and type rm. This makes sure one knows what gets deleted.