unlink(2) [bsd man page]

UNLINK(2)							System Calls Manual							 UNLINK(2)

NAME

       unlink - remove directory entry

SYNOPSIS

       unlink(path)
       char *path;

DESCRIPTION

       Unlink  removes	the  entry for the file path from its directory.  If this entry was the last link to the file, and no process has the file
       open, then all resources associated with the file are reclaimed.  If, however, the file was open in any process, the actual resource recla-
       mation is delayed until it is closed, even though the directory entry has disappeared.

RETURN VALUE

       Upon successful completion, a value of 0 is returned.  Otherwise, a value of -1 is returned and errno is set to indicate the error.

ERRORS

       The unlink succeeds unless:

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

       [EINVAL]       The pathname contains a character with the high-order bit set.

       [ENAMETOOLONG] A component of a pathname exceeded 255 characters, or an entire path name exceeded 1023 characters.

       [ENOENT]       The named file does not exist.

       [EACCES]       Search permission is denied for a component of the path prefix.

       [EACCES]       Write permission is denied on the directory containing the link to be removed.

       [ELOOP]	      Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating the pathname.

       [EPERM]	      The named file is a directory and the effective user ID of the process is not the super-user.

       [EPERM]	      The  directory  containing  the  file  is marked sticky, and neither the containing directory nor the file to be removed are
		      owned by the effective user ID.

       [EBUSY]	      The entry to be unlinked is the mount point for a mounted file system.

       [EIO]	      An I/O error occurred while deleting the directory entry or deallocating the inode.

       [EROFS]	      The named file resides on a read-only file system.

       [EFAULT]       Path points outside the process's allocated address space.

SEE ALSO

       close(2), link(2), rmdir(2)

4th Berkeley Distribution					   May 22, 1985 							 UNLINK(2)

UNLINK(2)						      BSD System Calls Manual							 UNLINK(2)

NAME

     unlink -- remove directory entry

SYNOPSIS

     #include <unistd.h>

     int
     unlink(const char *path);

DESCRIPTION

     The unlink() function removes the link named by path from its directory and decrements the link count of the file which was referenced by the
     link.  If that decrement reduces the link count of the file to zero, and no process has the file open, then all resources associated with the
     file are reclaimed.  If one or more process have the file open when the last link is removed, the link is removed, but the removal of the
     file is delayed until all references to it have been closed.

RETURN VALUES

     Upon successful completion, a value of 0 is returned.  Otherwise, a value of -1 is returned and errno is set to indicate the error.

ERRORS

     The unlink() system call will fail if:

     [EACCES]		Search permission is denied for a component of the path prefix.

     [EACCES]		Write permission is denied on the directory containing the link to be removed.

     [EBUSY]		The entry to be unlinked is the mount point for a mounted file system.

     [EBUSY]		The file named by the path argument cannot be unlinked because it is being used by the system or by another process.

     [EFAULT]		Path points outside the process's allocated address space.

     [EIO]		An I/O error occurs while deleting the directory entry or deallocating the inode.

     [ELOOP]		Too many symbolic links are encountered in translating the pathname.  This is taken to be indicative of a looping symbolic
			link.

     [ENAMETOOLONG]	A component of a pathname exceeds {NAME_MAX} characters, or an entire path name exceeds {PATH_MAX} characters (possibly as
			a result of expanding a symlink).

     [ENOENT]		The named file does not exist.

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

     [EPERM]		The named file is a directory and the effective user ID of the process is not the super-user.

     [EPERM]		The directory containing the file is marked sticky, and neither the containing directory nor the file to be removed are
			owned by the effective user ID.

     [EROFS]		The named file resides on a read-only file system.

SEE ALSO

     close(2), link(2), rmdir(2), symlink(7)

HISTORY

     An unlink() function call appeared in Version 6 AT&T UNIX.

4th Berkeley Distribution					   June 4, 1993 					 4th Berkeley Distribution