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rmdir(2)
NAME
  rmdir - Remove a directory file

SYNOPSIS
  #include <unistd.h>

  int rmdir(
	  const char *path );

STANDARDS
  Interfaces documented on this reference page conform to industry standards
  as follows:

  rmdir(): XSH4.0, XSH4.2, XSH5.0

  Refer to the standards(5) reference page for more information about
  industry standards and associated tags.

PARAMETERS
  path
      Specifies the directory pathname. The final component of the path
      parameter cannot be a symbolic link.

DESCRIPTION
  The rmdir() function removes the directory specified by the path parameter.
  The directory is removed only if it is an empty directory.

  For the rmdir() function to execute successfully, the calling process must
  have write access to the parent directory of the path parameter with
  respect to all of the system's access control policies.

  If the directory's link count becomes 0 (zero) and no process has the
  directory open, the space occupied by the directory is freed and the
  directory is no longer accessible. If one or more processes have the
  directory open when the last link is removed, the . (dot) and .. (dot-dot)
  entries, if present, are removed before the rmdir() function returns, and
  no new entries may be created in the directory. However, the directory is
  not removed until all references to the directory have been closed.

  Upon successful completion, the rmdir() function marks the st_ctime and
  st_mtime fields of the parent directory for update.

RETURN VALUES
  Upon successful completion, the rmdir() function returns a value of 0
  (zero). If the rmdir() function fails, a value of -1 is returned and errno
  is set to indicate the error.

ERRORS
  If the rmdir() function fails, the directory is not deleted and errno may
  be set to one of the following values:

  [EACCES]
      Search permission is denied on a component of the path parameter, or
      write permission is denied on the parent directory of the directory to
      be removed.

  [EACCES]
      The process does not have write access to the parent directory with
      respect to one of the system's access control policies.

  [EBUSY]
      The directory is in use as either the mount point for a file system or
      the current directory of the process that issued the rmdir() function.

  [EEXIST]
      The directory named by the path parameter is not empty.

  [EFAULT]
      The path parameter is an invalid address.

  [EIO]
      While reading from or writing to the file system, an I/O error
      occurred.

  [ELOOP]
      Too many links were encountered in translating path.

  [ENAMETOOLONG]
      The length of the path parameter exceeds PATH_MAX, or a pathname
      component is longer than NAME_MAX.

  [ENOENT]
      The directory named by the path parameter does not exist or is an empty
      string.

  [ENOTDIR]
      A component of the path parameter is not a directory.

  [EPERM]
      The S_ISVTX option is set on the parent directory of the directory to
      be removed, and the caller is not the file owner.

  [EROFS]
      The directory named by the path parameter resides on a read-only file
      system.

  [Tru64 UNIX]	For NFS file access, if the rmdir() function fails, errno may
  also be set to one of the following values:

  [EINVAL]
      The file position pointer associated with the filedes parameter was
      negative.

  [ENFILE]
      Indicates either that the system file table is full, or that there are
      too many files currently open in the system.

  [ESTALE]
      Indicates a stale NFS file handle.  An opened file was deleted by the
      server or another client; a client cannot open a file because the
      server has unmounted or unexported the remote directory; or the
      directory that contains an opened file was either unmounted or
      unexported by the server.

SEE ALSO
  Functions: chmod(2), mkdir(2), mknod(2), rename(2), umask(2), unlink(2),
  mkfifo(3), remove(3)

  Standards: standards(5)

Index for Section 2

Alphabetical listing for R

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