Usage: /usr/bin/rm [OPTION]... [FILE]... Remove (unlink) the FILE(s). -f, --force ignore nonexistent files and arguments, never prompt -i prompt before every removal -I prompt once before removing more than three files, or when removing recursively; less intrusive than -i, while still giving protection against most mistakes --interactive[=WHEN] prompt according to WHEN: never, once (-I), or always (-i); without WHEN, prompt always --one-file-system when removing a hierarchy recursively, skip any directory that is on a file system different from that of the corresponding command line argument --no-preserve-root do not treat '/' specially --preserve-root[=all] do not remove '/' (default); with 'all', reject any command line argument on a separate device from its parent -r, -R, --recursive remove directories and their contents recursively -d, --dir remove empty directories -v, --verbose explain what is being done --help display this help and exit --version output version information and exit By default, rm does not remove directories. Use the --recursive (-r or -R) option to remove each listed directory, too, along with all of its contents. Any attempt to remove a file whose last file name component is '.' or '..' is rejected with a diagnostic. To remove a file whose name starts with a '-', for example '-foo', use one of these commands: /usr/bin/rm -- -foo /usr/bin/rm ./-foo If you use rm to remove a file, it might be possible to recover some of its contents, given sufficient expertise and/or time. For greater assurance that the contents are unrecoverable, consider using shred(1). Report bugs to: . GNU coreutils home page: General help using GNU software: Full documentation or available locally via: info '(coreutils) rm invocation'