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The rmdir command

The rmdir command is used to remove empty directories from the filesystem in Linux. The rmdir command removes each and every directory specified in the command line only if these directories are empty.

Usage and Examples:

  1. remove directory and its ancestors rmdir -p a/b/c // is similar to 'rmdir a/b/c a/b a'
  2. remove multiple directories rmdir a b c // removes empty directories a,b and c

Syntax:

rmdir [OPTION]... DIRECTORY...

Additional Flags and their Functionalities:

Short Flag Long Flag Description
- --ignore-fail-on-non-empty ignore each failure that is solely because a directory is non-empty
-p --parents remove DIRECTORY and its ancestors
-d --delimiter=DELIM use DELIM instead of TAB for field delimiter
-v --verbose output a diagnostic for every directory processed

Last update: 2022-05-12
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