RMDIR(2)		   Linux Programmer's Manual		      RMDIR(2)



NAME
       rmdir - delete a directory

SYNOPSIS
       #include <unistd.h>

       int rmdir(const char *pathname);

DESCRIPTION
       rmdir() deletes a directory, which must be empty.

RETURN VALUE
       On  success,  zero is returned.	On error, -1 is returned, and errno is
       set appropriately.

ERRORS
       EACCES Write access  to	the  directory	containing  pathname  was  not
	      allowed,	or  one of the directories in the path prefix of path-
	      name did not allow search permission.   (See  also  path_resolu-
	      tion(7).

       EBUSY  pathname	is currently in use by the system or some process that
	      prevents its removal.  On Linux, this  means  pathname  is  cur-
	      rently  used  as	a  mount point or is the root directory of the
	      calling process.

       EFAULT pathname points outside your accessible address space.

       EINVAL pathname has .  as last component.

       ELOOP  Too many symbolic links were encountered in resolving pathname.

       ENAMETOOLONG
	      pathname was too long.

       ENOENT A directory component in pathname does not exist or  is  a  dan-
	      gling symbolic link.

       ENOMEM Insufficient kernel memory was available.

       ENOTDIR
	      pathname,	 or  a	component  used as a directory in pathname, is
	      not, in fact, a directory.

       ENOTEMPTY
	      pathname contains entries other than . and .. ; or, pathname has
	      ..  as its final component.  POSIX.1 also allows EEXIST for this
	      condition.

       EPERM  The directory containing pathname has the sticky	bit  (S_ISVTX)
	      set  and	the process's effective user ID is neither the user ID
	      of the file to be deleted nor that of the	 directory  containing
	      it,  and the process is not privileged (Linux: does not have the
	      CAP_FOWNER capability).

       EPERM  The filesystem containing pathname does not support the  removal
	      of directories.

       EROFS  pathname refers to a directory on a read-only filesystem.

CONFORMING TO
       POSIX.1-2001, POSIX.1-2008, SVr4, 4.3BSD.

BUGS
       Infelicities  in	 the  protocol underlying NFS can cause the unexpected
       disappearance of directories which are still being used.

SEE ALSO
       rm(1), rmdir(1), chdir(2), chmod(2),  mkdir(2),	rename(2),  unlink(2),
       unlinkat(2)

COLOPHON
       This  page  is  part of release 4.10 of the Linux man-pages project.  A
       description of the project, information about reporting bugs,  and  the
       latest	  version     of     this    page,    can    be	   found    at
       https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.



Linux				  2015-08-08			      RMDIR(2)