Jim Meyering wrote: > Voelker, Bernhard wrote: > > > I think Davide's point is not about the # comment ... rm won't see > > that on argv anyway. The point is that 'rm -f' does not complain about > > missing operands while 'rm' does: > > > > $ rm > > rm: missing operand > > Try `rm --help' for more information. > > $ rm -f > > $ > > > > According to the info, '-f' just silences error messages for files > > which do not exist (and never to prompt for confirmation), but why > > should it also affect the "missing operand" message? > > Two reasons: > > - that's what rm -f has always done > - because that's more useful. Otherwise, "rm -rf $file_list" would > have to be wrapped in code to handle specially the case in which > $file_list is empty.
Good point. That means, the info page could be enhanced to mention that special case (see below). Have a nice day, Berny >From 55d64bcdfdba4726c6e2668066bb25f4bfa6c0b6 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Bernhard Voelker <m...@bernhard-voelker.de> Date: Thu, 16 Feb 2012 13:29:44 +0100 Subject: [PATCH] doc: document 'rm -f' better MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit * doc/coreutils.texi (rm invocation): Mention that the option '-f' also silences the message for missing operands which is useful in scripts e.g. for "rm -f $file_list" when $file_list is empty. * src/rm.c (usage): Likewise. Reported by Jérémy Magrin in http://bugs.gnu.org/10819 --- doc/coreutils.texi | 2 +- src/rm.c | 2 +- 2 files changed, 2 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-) diff --git a/doc/coreutils.texi b/doc/coreutils.texi index 02c3a2a..87624c2 100644 --- a/doc/coreutils.texi +++ b/doc/coreutils.texi @@ -8769,7 +8769,7 @@ The program accepts the following options. Also see @ref{Common options}. @itemx --force @opindex -f @opindex --force -Ignore nonexistent files and never prompt the user. +Ignore nonexistent files, missing operands and never prompt the user. Ignore any previous @option{--interactive} (@option{-i}) option. @item -i diff --git a/src/rm.c b/src/rm.c index db525d0..02809f2 100644 --- a/src/rm.c +++ b/src/rm.c @@ -135,7 +135,7 @@ usage (int status) fputs (_("\ Remove (unlink) the FILE(s).\n\ \n\ - -f, --force ignore nonexistent files, never prompt\n\ + -f, --force ignore nonexistent files and arguments, never prompt\n\ -i prompt before every removal\n\ "), stdout); fputs (_("\ -- 1.7.7