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asciiphil
Asked: 2016-07-08 06:34:58 +0800 CST

Delete ZFS filesystem with snapshots but no other children?

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You can delete a ZFS filesystem (or other dataset) with zfs destroy <dataset>. That fails if the dataset has children, including snapshots. zfs destroy -r <dataset> will remove the filesystem and its children, but will also destroy any non-snapshot children of the filesystem. Is there a succinct way to say "Delete this filesystem and its snapshots, but only if it has no non-snapshot children"?

Basically, I have a number of nested filesystems and I'm using snapshots extensively, both for replication and for cheap backups. I would like a way to easily remove child filesystems and their snapshots (e.g. zfs destroy tank/container/leaf) while providing a modicum of protection against accidentally nuking the entire filesystem collection (e.g. zfs destroy tank/container<enter>leaf)

In case it matters, I'm using ZFS on Linux with Scientific Linux 7.

Solution:

Based on longneck's comment, I can do this with two lines:

zfs destroy tank/example/leaf@%
zfs destroy tank/example/leaf

I've tested it and it does exactly what I want.

zfs

2 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    I haven't tested it, but I have seen in other posts that you can remove all snapshots like this:

    zfs destroy -rv dataset_or_vol_name@%

    You could then follow-up with your destroy command to remove the database.

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  2. This isn't a one liner, but you could use the output from

    zfs list -t all -r -H <dataset>

    And have a script go through it and verify things carefully and destroy the the appropriate filesystems.

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