rm -iR
Jan Schaumann <[email protected]> Tue, 3 Feb 2026 14:30:46 -0500
| Newsgroups | gmane.os.netbsd.devel.userlevel |
|---|---|
| Message-ID | <[email protected]> |
Hello, rm(1) currently says for the '-R' flag: "If the -i option is specified, the user is prompted for confirmation before each directory's contents are processed (as well as before the attempt is made to remove the directory)." But it's actually a bit misleading and only prompts for _removal_ of a directory, not for processing the contents: $ mkdir -p dir/subdir/subsub dir/subdir2 $ touch dir/file dir/subdir/file dir/subdir/subsub/file dir/subdir2/file $ rm -ir dir remove 'dir'? n $ On macOS, rm(1) behaves like this: $ rm -ir dir examine files in directory dir? y examine files in directory dir/subdir2? y remove dir/subdir2/file? n examine files in directory dir/subdir2/subsub? n remove dir/subdir2? Linux / GNU coreutils likewise: $ rm -ir dir rm: descend into directory 'dir'? y rm: descend into directory 'dir/subdir'? y rm: remove regular empty file 'dir/subdir/file'? n rm: descend into directory 'dir/subdir/subsub'? n rm: remove regular empty file 'dir/file'? That behavior seems to match what the manual page describes much more than what we do. Should we match that? -Jan