[ale] delete all files but leave folder structure intact

Geoffrey Myers lists at serioustechnology.com
Tue Apr 19 13:27:42 EDT 2011


Lightner, Jeff wrote:
> No but it can remove the other files/directories below the parent.

True, but the original premise was it would remove $HOME when executed 
from $HOME.

> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: ale-bounces at ale.org [mailto:ale-bounces at ale.org] On Behalf Of
> Geoffrey Myers
> Sent: Tuesday, April 19, 2011 12:23 PM
> To: Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts
> Subject: Re: [ale] delete all files but leave folder structure intact
> 
> Lightner, Jeff wrote:
>> Picky picky
>>
>> Then don't ever do "rm -rf .*"
> 
> Sorry, still won't remove the directory you're sitting in:
> 
> centosvmfoo> rm -rf .*
> rm: cannot remove `.' or `..'
> rm: cannot remove `.' or `..'
> 
> :)
> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: ale-bounces at ale.org [mailto:ale-bounces at ale.org] On Behalf Of
>> Geoffrey Myers
>> Sent: Tuesday, April 19, 2011 7:50 AM
>> To: Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts
>> Subject: Re: [ale] delete all files but leave folder structure intact
>>
>> Lightner, Jeff wrote:
>>> Also be sure NEVER to do "rm .*" in any directory.   Many a newbie
> has
>>> surprised themselves by trying to remove .profile, .bashrc .mozilla
>>> etc... that way.
>> Pretty sure that's not going to work as since you're in the directory,
> 
>> you can't remove it.  Further, you can't remove a directory with 'rm' 
>> without the recursive option.
>>
>>
>>> The ".*" will match ".." which is a hard link to the parent directory
>> so
>>> tells it to remove a directory above.
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: ale-bounces at ale.org [mailto:ale-bounces at ale.org] On Behalf Of
>>> Michael B. Trausch
>>> Sent: Monday, April 18, 2011 3:46 PM
>>> To: Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts
>>> Subject: Re: [ale] delete all files but leave folder structure intact
>>>
>>> On 04/18/2011 03:22 PM, Ed Cashin wrote:
>>>> To read into your question a bit, I'll assume you'd like to remove
>>>> special files and symbolic links and named fifos as well as regular
>>>> files.
>>>>
>>>>   find xyz ! -type d -print0 | xargs -0 rm
>>> Nice.  I hadn't thought of that.
>>>
>>> 	--- Mike
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> 
> 


-- 
Until later, Geoffrey

"I predict future happiness for America if they can prevent
the government from wasting the labors of the people under
the pretense of taking care of them."
- Thomas Jefferson


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