Rm command not working

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AssassinTourist Posted messages 409 Registration date   Status Contributeur Last intervention   -  
AssassinTourist Posted messages 409 Registration date   Status Contributeur Last intervention   -
Hello,

I wanted to delete a non-empty folder (with lots of files and subfolders) and I saw that I needed to use this command (rm -rf folder_to_delete). I proceed carefully as root, it doesn't give me any error messages, yet it doesn't delete my folder. What consideration am I missing?

Thank you in advance for your help!

2 réponses

zipe31 Posted messages 34620 Registration date   Status Contributeur Last intervention   6 500
 
Hi,

Be careful with that command as root :-((

What exactly is the syntax you're typing?
Add the option "-v" (verbose)...
Are you providing the correct path?

--
Zen my nuggets ;-)
Do something for the environment, close your windows and adopt a penguin.
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AssassinTourist Posted messages 409 Registration date   Status Contributeur Last intervention   1 313
 
Thank you for trying to help me, but I more or less solved my problem by bluffing.

So basically, I was being very careful since I was root
Then I went up above my directory
I typed rm -rf folder_to_delete (so no paths, but I tried with the full path and it didn't change my problem, so whatever...)

What I did was I already deleted what was in the directory:
rm -rf folder_to_delete/* (there, I panicked, so I did a half-path instead of just going into the folder and doing *)
I was able to see that all my subfolders and files were indeed deleted.
And finally, I went one level up to do rm -rf folder_to_delete, and there, it deleted correctly.

But still, I don't understand why it didn't work at first u__u If I run into the problem again, I'll try -v indeed.
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