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I try to remove a folder with 

rm -rf foldername

… but it says

rm: cannot remove folder :is a directory.

What's wrong?

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2  
I know it goes without saying but given the question; be very careful with rm, particularly with -r being used. its one of the commands you really want to make sure you know what it'll do. Try using -i which will prompt for each deletion, until you get comfortable with it. – Sirex Oct 20 '11 at 11:27
Does the folder you are trying to delete contain any special characters or spaces? Have you tried putting foldername in quotes? – chuck Oct 20 '11 at 12:23
The issue is difficult to explain without knowing further details. Are there really no other error messages? Could be that one or more files could not be removed because of permission problems. In this case the parent directory cannot be removed also. – ktf Oct 20 '11 at 12:56

2 Answers

up vote 2 down vote accepted

Omit the space between - and rf.

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sorry, i mistyped. there is no space between - and rf actually. – alwbtc Oct 20 '11 at 11:39
what does ls -l foldername and whoami give ? – Sirex Oct 20 '11 at 12:14
1  
sorry, an admin has told me that there is a script that removes -rf whenever I use it. problem is solved. – alwbtc Nov 3 '11 at 13:50
1  
LOL! Worthy to be remembered in the all time favourites UNIX issues :) – ktf Nov 3 '11 at 14:37
up vote 0 down vote

Is the foldername you're trying to remove literally . Because it is defined as an error to attempt to remove . and ... Instead, change one level up and then remove it.

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