rm

rm, short for remove, is a shell command for removing files (which includes special files such as directories) from the file system. The command may not actually delete a file (release its storage for reuse) since it only unlinks it – removes a hard link to a file via the unlink() system call. If a file has multiple links and less than all are removed, then the file remains in the file system; accessible via its other links. When a file's only link is removed, then the file is deleted – releasing its storage space for other use.

• GNU Coreutils Project Homepage [EN]

• GNU Coreutils [EN] @ Homebrew Formula

• rm [EN] @ Wikipedia
• rm [DE] @ Wikipedia

Documentation

• rm [EN] @ GNU Coreutils Manual

• man 1 'rm'
  • BSD [EN]
  • GNU [EN]

Syntax

rm [PARAMETER ...] [FILE/DIRECTORY ...]

Parameters

General

The following parameters can be used with all version of rm:

NOTE:

The BSD version only supports the short form (e.g. -f) of these parameters!

-f, --force

Ignore nonexistent files, never prompt.

-r, -R, --recursive

Remove directories and their contents recursively.

-v, --verbose

Explain what is being done.

GNU

The following parameters can be used with the GNU version of rm:

-d, --dir

Remove empty directories.