RMDIR(2) BSD System Calls Manual RMDIR(2)NAMErmdir — remove a directory file
SYNOPSIS
#include <unistd.h>
int
rmdir(const char *path);
DESCRIPTIONRmdir() removes a directory file whose name is given by path. The direc‐
tory must not have any entries other than ‘.’ and ‘..’.
RETURN VALUES
A 0 is returned if the remove succeeds; otherwise a -1 is returned and an
error code is stored in the global location errno.
ERRORS
The named file is removed unless:
[EACCES] Search permission is denied for a component of the
path prefix.
[EACCES] Write permission is denied on the directory containing
the link to be removed.
[EBUSY] The directory to be removed is the mount point for a
mounted file system.
[EFAULT] Path points outside the process's allocated address
space.
[EIO] An I/O error occurs while deleting the directory entry
or deallocating the inode.
[ELOOP] Too many symbolic links are encountered in translating
the pathname. This is taken to be indicative of a
looping symbolic link.
[ENAMETOOLONG] A component of a pathname (possibly expanded by a sym‐
bolic link) exceeds {NAME_MAX} characters, or an
entire path name exceeded {PATH_MAX} characters.
[ENOENT] The named directory does not exist.
[ENOTDIR] A component of the path is not a directory.
[ENOTEMPTY] The named directory contains files other than ‘.’ and
‘..’ in it.
[EPERM] The directory containing the directory to be removed
is marked sticky, and neither the containing directory
nor the directory to be removed are owned by the
effective user ID.
[EROFS] The directory entry to be removed resides on a read-
only file system.
SEE ALSOmkdir(2), unlink(2)HISTORY
The rmdir() function call appeared in 4.2BSD.
4.2 Berkeley Distribution June 4, 1993 4.2 Berkeley Distribution
