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rmdir(2)
NAME
  rmdir - Removes 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(): 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 flag 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.

RELATED INFORMATION
  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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