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Top Forums UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers Special meaning characters in dir names Post 302173590 by JWilliams on Friday 7th of March 2008 06:07:44 AM
Old 03-07-2008
Special meaning characters in dir names

Hello,

I've had a daemon go a little bit mental and create directories using somments from a config file. The end result is I've ended up with directories with names such as #, 5625), (5725 etc etc etc...

However, when I try and delete them I get syntax errors, ( not expected,

rmdir #
Usage: rmdir [-p] DirectoryName...

etc...

Can I quote these to tell the shell to take them literally, as opposed to reading their special meanings? If not, any other suggestions on how to get rid of them?

Thanks,

John.
 

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RMDIR(1)						    BSD General Commands Manual 						  RMDIR(1)

NAME
rmdir -- remove directories SYNOPSIS
rmdir [-pv] directory ... DESCRIPTION
The rmdir utility removes the directory entry specified by each directory argument, provided it is empty. Arguments are processed in the order given. In order to remove both a parent directory and a subdirectory of that parent, the subdirectory must be specified first so the parent directory is empty when rmdir tries to remove it. The following option is available: -p Each directory argument is treated as a pathname of which all components will be removed, if they are empty, starting with the last most component. (See rm(1) for fully non-discriminant recursive removal.) -v Be verbose, listing each directory as it is removed. EXIT STATUS
The rmdir utility exits with one of the following values: 0 Each directory entry specified by a directory operand referred to an empty directory and was removed successfully. >0 An error occurred. EXAMPLES
Remove the directory foobar, if it is empty: $ rmdir foobar Remove all directories up to and including cow, stopping at the first non-empty directory (if any): $ rmdir -p cow/horse/monkey SEE ALSO
rm(1) STANDARDS
The rmdir utility is expected to be IEEE Std 1003.2 (``POSIX.2'') compatible. HISTORY
A rmdir command appeared in Version 1 AT&T UNIX. BSD
March 15, 2013 BSD
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