4 ms·

I had a close call one time while trying to delete a directory `~/foo` and its contents. Here's what I typed — can you spot the error? rm -rf ~ /foo I re

I had a close call one time while trying to delete a directory `~/foo` and its contents. Here's what I typed — can you spot the error? rm -rf ~ /foo I realized after a second or so and hit CONTROL-C. Nothing seemed to have been deleted, so I think it may have been still winding up.

garaetjjte 6y ago
rm is not like explorer.exe and is rather fast with destruction, so I guess you must have deleted some dotfiles.
- rectang 6y ago
  Could be. This was on a Mac, around 2013, so it should have been pretty snappy. Whatever it got I never noticed. Maybe it was trawling through a bunch of build detritus in `~/.cpan` or something.
  - andrewmackrodt 6y ago
    I accidentally did the same on my Mac via a shell script where I assumed mktemp worked the same as gnu mktemp, it does not. IIRC it was my /Applications directory that was first to be hit; most of the directory was unaffected due to file permissions but it did delete some files despite me catching thee error and sending sigkill within seconds.
gcpwnd 6y ago
rm -rf on root will query for confirmation. Not sure if this happens on all systems or even all top level directories.
em-bee 6y ago
hah, i had a tool where i configured ~/something as a target directory in its config. except that the tool did not understand ~ and literally created a directory named '~' guess what i typed to remove it? i lost a lot of work that day. since then i developed the habit to always only use rmdir for directories, and first go into the directory to remove files with rm. i also avoid rm * by finding some common parts like an extension that most files share. i don't want rm * to be in my history where i might accidentally call it.
- likeclockwork 6y ago
  Blender tried this on me a few months ago. I used mv to rename the directory before deleting it though, the fear caught me as soon as I realized I had a directory named ~ sitting in my home directory.
  - em-bee 6y ago
    it tried to blend in ;-) mv is a clever idea. rename to something safe, which can be undone if you get it wrong. i use a similar approach when deleting a lot but not all files from a directory. i first move the files into a new directory, double check that every file is in the right place and then delete the new directory safely.

garaetjjte 6y ago

rm is not like explorer.exe and is rather fast with destruction, so I guess you must have deleted some dotfiles.

rectang 6y ago
Could be. This was on a Mac, around 2013, so it should have been pretty snappy. Whatever it got I never noticed. Maybe it was trawling through a bunch of build detritus in `~/.cpan` or something.
- andrewmackrodt 6y ago
  I accidentally did the same on my Mac via a shell script where I assumed mktemp worked the same as gnu mktemp, it does not. IIRC it was my /Applications directory that was first to be hit; most of the directory was unaffected due to file permissions but it did delete some files despite me catching thee error and sending sigkill within seconds.

gcpwnd 6y ago

rm -rf on root will query for confirmation. Not sure if this happens on all systems or even all top level directories.

em-bee 6y ago

hah, i had a tool where i configured ~/something as a target directory in its config. except that the tool did not understand ~ and literally created a directory named '~' guess what i typed to remove it? i lost a lot of work that day. since then i developed the habit to always only use rmdir for directories, and first go into the directory to remove files with rm. i also avoid rm * by finding some common parts like an extension that most files share. i don't want rm * to be in my history where i might accidentally call it.

likeclockwork 6y ago
Blender tried this on me a few months ago. I used mv to rename the directory before deleting it though, the fear caught me as soon as I realized I had a directory named ~ sitting in my home directory.
- em-bee 6y ago
  it tried to blend in ;-) mv is a clever idea. rename to something safe, which can be undone if you get it wrong. i use a similar approach when deleting a lot but not all files from a directory. i first move the files into a new directory, double check that every file is in the right place and then delete the new directory safely.