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UnKNOWn
Asked: 2020-04-19 05:39:45 +0800 CST

Is there a way reverse of what mkdir -p option does?

  • 772

I Use Ubuntu 18.04, 19.10

using #!/bin/bash script how to remove the directories if they are empty from far end and stop at the directory having any file/files.

say.. I have created multiple directories with the below command

mkdir -p $HOME/.local/my/sub/directories/1/2/3

lateron during the time I have created lot of files in all directories starting from the directory "my to 1/2/3".

After some time I have deleted all the files in the directories "my", "directories", "1", "2", "3". Note that directory sub is having some files..

mkdir -p option will see if there are parent directories in the command mkdir -p $HOME/.local/my/sub/directories/1/2/3 and its safe.

Question: like above is there any command to see if the directories are empty and delete from far end and stop at directory sub I mean $HOME/.local/my/sub

command-line bash directory

3 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    The reversal of the mkdir -p command would be rmdir -p. rmdir -p will remove the folder structure up till the folder is not empty. You should be able to use rmdir instead of mkdir on your command:

    rmdir -p $HOME/.local/my/sub/directories/1/2/3

    You can also specify wildcards like if your $HOME/.local/my/sub/ contained like directories1, directories2 and directories3 for example, it could be done as:

    rmdir -p $HOME/.local/my/sub/directories*/1/2/3

    or

    rmdir -p $HOME/.local/my/sub/*/1/2/3

    If any folder as it is removing them contains data or another folder you will receive an error message that the directory is not empty and stops.

    rmdir: failed to remove directory '/home/user/.local/my/sub': Directory not empty

    Hope this helps!

    • 64

  2. There are two ways I'd attempt this. The easy method is as follows:

    # Command to return only empty directories in the current directory:
find . -type d -empty -print

    Now on my version of Ubuntu, I can simply perform the following:

    # Find empty files, and delete them:
find . -type d -empty -delete

    Otherwise, you can create some script with a logic to count files in a directory, and delete them. Here is a starting point for counting files in sub-directories:

    #!/bin/bash

for i in */ .*/ ; do 
    echo -n $i": " ; 
    (find "$i" -type f | wc -l) ; 
done
    • 7

  3. This is closer to the reverse of mkdir -p:

    $ cat deldir
#!/bin/bash
[[ $# = 0 ]] && { echo "usage: ${0##*/} DIRECTORY..." >&2; exit 1; }
rc=0
while [[ $# != 0 ]] ;do
  dir=${1%/}    # in case someone specifies DIRECTORY/ out of habit
  shift
  while true ;do
    rmdir -- "$dir" || { rc=1; break; }
    [[ $dir = */* ]] || break
    dir=${dir%/*}
  done
done
exit $rc

    Example:

    mkdir -p a/b/c x/y/z
deldir   a/b/c x/y/z
    • 0