UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Variants of your quick-and-dirty command

Code:

rm -rf `cd $TGTDIR && ls -t | awk 'NR>5'`

Code:

rm -rf `ls -dt $TGTDIR/* | awk 'NR>5'`

Hey Cragon,

I have Linux machine.
TGTDIR conatains no non-directory files.
There are no naming mistakes.

I have a directory which contains the subdirs only. these subdirs are created as a result of a run every hour. As the purging is necessary, I need to retain only the latest five.

Thank you

---------- Post updated at 12:26 PM ---------- Previous update was at 12:19 PM ----------

Hello Ravinder,

Your modified post lists the expected subdirs to be deleted.
But unable to delete when I tried the latter.

Thank you,

I repeat:
What shell are you using?

In what way did the command:rm -rf `ls -t $TGTDIR | awk 'NR>5'` "not work"? If it produces diagnostic messages, show them to us (in CODE tags).

Hey MadeInGermeny,

Thanks, The code worked.

---------- Post updated at 12:30 PM ---------- Previous update was at 12:28 PM ----------

Hello Mr. Cragun,

I'm using bash shell.
It did not show any error messages either.

Thank you.

Hello Devendra Hupri,

Seems to me a permission issue, could you please confirm/make sure you have proper permissions to the directories,
let us know the error messages in case you have queries.


Thanks,
R. Singh

One last time:
In what way did the command: rm -rf `ls -t $TGTDIR | awk 'NR>5'` "not work"?

Hello Mr.Cragun,

When I tried

Code:

rm -rf `ls -t $TGTDIR | awk 'NR>5'`

from any other directory, It was unable to delete, exited normally, without yielding any ,messages with 0 status.

But when I executed the same command after doing a cd to TGTDIR, It worked.

---------- Post updated at 01:20 PM ---------- Previous update was at 12:42 PM ----------

Hello Ravinder,

I'm unable to delete with your

Code:

ls -ltr $TGTDIR | awk '/^d/ {A++;X[++j]=$NF} END{for(i=1;i<=A-5;i++){print "rm -rf " X[i]}}' | sh

though it prints the directories to be deleted.

Thank you.