Commands rm

rm

Remove (delete) files from the filesystem.

Synopsis

rm <file1> [file2] [file3] ...

Description

rm removes (deletes) one or more files from the filesystem. The command accepts multiple filenames as arguments and will attempt to delete each one.

Warning: Deleted files cannot be recovered! Use with caution.

Arguments

• file1, file2, ...: One or more files to delete. Paths can be absolute or relative to the current working directory.

Return Values

For each file, rm will either successfully delete it or report an error:

• Success: File is removed from the filesystem
• Error codes:
  • -2: No such file or directory
  • -13: Permission denied
  • -21: Is a directory (use rmdir for directories)
  • Other: Error code number displayed

Examples

Delete a single file

> rm test.txt

Delete multiple files

> rm file1.txt file2.txt file3.txt
Removed 3 files

Handle errors

> rm nonexistent.txt
rm: cannot remove 'nonexistent.txt': No such file or directory

Mixed success and errors

> rm good.txt bad.txt another.txt
rm: cannot remove 'bad.txt': No such file or directory
Removed 2 files, 1 error

Implementation Details

rm is implemented in CupidC (/bin/rm.cc) and demonstrates:

Token Parsing

Custom parse_token() function to split space-separated arguments:

int parse_token(char *str, int start, char *out, int maxlen) {
    // Skip whitespace, extract token, return length
}

This function handles:

• Leading/trailing whitespace
• Multiple arguments in a single string
• Null termination

VFS Integration

Uses vfs_unlink(path) syscall to delete files:

int result = vfs_unlink(path);
if (result == 0) {
    // Success
} else {
    // Handle error codes
}

Error Handling

Comprehensive error reporting with human-readable messages for common POSIX error codes.

Source Code Location

/bin/rm.cc

See Also

• vfs_unlink - VFS unlink syscall
• CupidC Language Reference
• ls - List directory contents
• cat - Display file contents

Limitations

• Cannot remove directories (use rmdir instead)
• No -r recursive flag (yet)
• No -f force flag (yet)
• No wildcard support (yet)

Version History

• 1.0.0 - Initial CupidC implementation
  • Multi-file deletion support
  • Path resolution
  • Error code handling with human-readable messages
  • Summary output for multiple files