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Re: small note about 'rm' portability
From: |
Paul Eggert |
Subject: |
Re: small note about 'rm' portability |
Date: |
Tue, 24 Oct 2006 17:37:03 -0700 |
User-agent: |
Gnus/5.1008 (Gnus v5.10.8) Emacs/21.4 (gnu/linux) |
Bruno Haible <address@hidden> writes:
> I think this qualifies as a portability pitfall. How about documenting it?
Thanks. I installed the following slightly-more-general change.
2006-10-24 Paul Eggert <address@hidden>
* doc/autoconf.texi (Limitations of Usual Tools): Document that rm
needs operands on NetBSD 2.0.2. Problem reported by Bruno Haible.
--- doc/autoconf.texi.~1.1099.~ 2006-10-22 21:55:42.000000000 -0700
+++ doc/autoconf.texi 2006-10-24 17:34:07.000000000 -0700
@@ -13597,6 +13597,11 @@ This problem no longer exists in Mac OS
@prindex @command{rm}
The @option{-f} and @option{-r} options are portable.
+It is not portable to invoke @command{rm} without operands. For
+example, on many systems @samp{rm -f -r} (with no other arguments)
+silently succeeds without doing anything, but it fails with a diagnostic
+on address@hidden 2.0.2.
+
A file might not be removed even if its parent directory is writable
and searchable. Many Posix hosts cannot remove a mount point, a named
stream, a working directory, or a last link to a file that is being