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bug#7775: rm -f emits no error message when deleting nonexistent file
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From: |
Eric Blake |
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Subject: |
bug#7775: rm -f emits no error message when deleting nonexistent file |
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Date: |
Mon, 03 Jan 2011 10:00:21 -0700 |
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User-agent: |
Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux x86_64; en-US; rv:1.9.2.13) Gecko/20101209 Fedora/3.1.7-0.35.b3pre.fc14 Lightning/1.0b3pre Mnenhy/0.8.3 Thunderbird/3.1.7 |
On 01/03/2011 08:12 AM, Jeremy Hetzler wrote:
> rm normally produces an error when you delete a nonexistent file. However,
> under -f, you get no error message. I would argue this is a bug.
Thanks for the report; however, this behavior is by design, and required
by POSIX:
http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/utilities/rm.html
> 1. If the file does not exist:
>
> a. If the -f option is not specified, rm shall write a diagnostic message
> to standard error.
> b. Go on to any remaining files.
That is, the whole point of -f is to silence warnings, including
warnings about non-existent files.
--
Eric Blake address@hidden +1-801-349-2682
Libvirt virtualization library http://libvirt.org
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