POSIX requires that rm have an argument, but also that it exit with 0 status if "All of the named directory entries for which rm performed actions equivalent to the rmdir() or unlink() functions were removed." This puts the invocation of rm without arguments in the implementation's realm, where currently, coreutils is not consistent on what it returns:
$ rm rm: missing operand Try `rm --help' for more information. $ echo $? # used improperly 1 $ rm -f $ echo $? # all (zero) calls to unlink succeeded 0 Both return statuses are defensible (neither is more intuitive). So is it worth bringing this up with the austin group? Is it worth changing rm to be consistent in its status regardless of options, or to keep the status quo of -f affecting the status? And if it is made consistent, I would lean towards a status of 0, so that constructs like "rm -f `generate a list`" succeed even if the list is empty. On the other hand, solaris rm also has the -f dichotomy, but returns 2 for syntax error if -f is not present. Furthermore, it is always possible for forced deletes to match POSIX requirements by using this idiom, since the file '' does not exist: rm -f `generate a list` '' But the same cannot be said for rm when -f is not in effect. Should this be mentioned in the autoconf portability documentation? Are there any systems out there where "rm -f ``" has non-zero status? -- Eric Blake _______________________________________________ Bug-coreutils mailing list Bug-coreutils@gnu.org http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/bug-coreutils
