Sometimes, there are write protected files and then you'll be asked to confirm the removal. The recursive option -r is essential for removing sub-directories.

Which is a way of instructing the rm command to delete everything it sees in the current directory recursively.

You can use the rm command like this: rm -r * Once you are sure that nothing important is in the directory, it is time to delete the contents. Step 3: Delete all files and folders in the directory If there are sub-directories, please ensure nothing important is in there.

You should check the directory contents to ensure that you are not deleting any important files. It's good to ensure that you are in the current directory: pwd Step 2: List the directory contents Use the cd command to switch to the directory you want to empty.įor example, I am going to delete all the contents of the /home/abhishek/sample directory. This reduces the risk of accidentally deleting the contents of a wrong directory. This is why I advise switching to the directory you want to empty and then using the rm command. And if you have to remove multiple files using wildcard, you must be extra cautious. You have to be careful while deleting files. Linux command line does not have a recycle bin. Properly removing all files in a directory Let's see about deleting all the contents of a directory in detail. If you use rm -r dir, it will delete the directory along with its contents. Please note that this is different than using rm on the directory name directly without /*. So, you are instructing the rm command to remove everything in the given directory. To empty a directory, you use the following command: rm -r path_to_dir/* You could do it to clean up a project, free up space or for any other purpose. Not the directory itself but the contents of the directory. At times you'll need to delete all the files of a directory.

Delete file in cmd