-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 The Tuesday 2005-10-18 at 14:37 +0100, Fergus Wilde wrote:

...

How can i erase this file (sen it to trash?).

$ cd

$ cd Desktop

$ su [give root password]

# rm -rf [name-of-your-directory]

Are you joking? For a single file? As root? What if he mistypes and erases his whole disk? - -- Cheers, Carlos Robinson -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.0 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Made with pgp4pine 1.76 iD8DBQFDVRbvtTMYHG2NR9URAv7WAJ0bLOPGhu0WW+tGJXJ17+eBKfYTrACeIFfd 1DY1ANPZvo534KuNfZzD0ao= =yJkW -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

On Tue, 2005-10-18 at 19:50 +0200, Steve Graegert wrote:

On 10/18/05, Carlos E. R. wrote:

...

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1

The Tuesday 2005-10-18 at 14:37 +0100, Fergus Wilde wrote:

...

...

How can i erase this file (sen it to trash?).

$ cd

$ cd Desktop

$ su [give root password]

# rm -rf [name-of-your-directory]

Are you joking?

For a single file? As root? What if he mistypes and erases his whole disk?

The OP suggested that the file is mysteriously locked somehow. What would you suggest to do about it without being in superuser mode (and without rebooting, of course)?

\Steve

How about sudo rm and be done with it. and NO a reboot is -not- necessary. -- Ken Schneider UNIX since 1989, linux since 1994, SuSE since 1998

On 10/18/05, Ken Schneider wrote:

On Tue, 2005-10-18 at 19:50 +0200, Steve Graegert wrote:

...

On 10/18/05, Carlos E. R. wrote:

...

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1

The Tuesday 2005-10-18 at 14:37 +0100, Fergus Wilde wrote:

...

...

How can i erase this file (sen it to trash?).

$ cd

$ cd Desktop

$ su [give root password]

# rm -rf [name-of-your-directory]

Are you joking?

For a single file? As root? What if he mistypes and erases his whole disk?

The OP suggested that the file is mysteriously locked somehow. What would you suggest to do about it without being in superuser mode (and without rebooting, of course)?

\Steve

How about sudo rm and be done with it. and NO a reboot is -not- necessary.

As can be read in the OP Juan already tried to do so and found that it is "locked" (whatever it means). Hmm, what now? \Steve

On 10/18/05, Sandy Drobic wrote:

Steve Graegert wrote:

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...

...

The OP suggested that the file is mysteriously locked somehow. What would you suggest to do about it without being in superuser mode (and without rebooting, of course)?

As can be read in the OP Juan already tried to do so and found that it is "locked" (whatever it means). Hmm, what now?

Find out what process is locking the file and kill it: fuser -k -i /path/to/file

As root, of course :-) \Steve

On Tuesday 18 October 2005 20:12, Sandy Drobic wrote:

Steve Graegert wrote:

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...

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The OP suggested that the file is mysteriously locked somehow. What would you suggest to do about it without being in superuser mode (and without rebooting, of course)?

As can be read in the OP Juan already tried to do so and found that it is "locked" (whatever it means). Hmm, what now?

Find out what process is locking the file and kill it: fuser -k -i /path/to/file

Files aren't locked that way in linux, you can delete a file even if a million applications were holding it open (although of course it wouldn't be finally deleted until the last program exited or closed the file, but it wouldn't be visible in the directory anymore) The directory must be "locked" (as in having a pad lock on the icon on the desktop) because it's owned by another user. If it were a single file or an empty directory you would be able to delete it anyway without becoming root, but a directory with files in it is worse. You can rename it if you like, but to delete it you need to become root, since you need to delete the files in the directory as well as the directory itself.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 The Tuesday 2005-10-18 at 19:50 +0200, Steve Graegert wrote:

...

Are you joking?

For a single file? As root? What if he mistypes and erases his whole disk?

The OP suggested that the file is mysteriously locked somehow. What would you suggest to do about it without being in superuser mode (and without rebooting, of course)?

But Fergus sugested to do: # rm -rf [name-of-your-directory] as root. The -r stands for recursive, and -f for force (no questions asked). If there is an error, an horrible lot of files may be erased, he could destroy the system. The proper procedure would be to become superuser, yes, then delete each thing explicitly. First empty the directory, then erase it with rd. If a recursive erase is used, as root, first you have to check carefully what is inside, specially links. IMO, of course :-) - -- Cheers, Carlos Robinson -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.0 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Made with pgp4pine 1.76 iD8DBQFDVaEYtTMYHG2NR9URAuIpAJ901z/cRUpF2hVwho/F5M6apFk2LQCgmJDX 09X5Fjylic7/ugVRZEuyhiM= =4FhS -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Fergus Wilde wrote:

But if he's that bad at following directions he probably crosses the road by shutting his eyes tight and running out shouting 'Mind the chickens!' and then doing the jitterbug on the centre line and finds his way home by following the nicest shaped cloud.

Which is the perfect picture of an average newbie. Present company excluded of course. Real newbies don't read lists. :-) Regards, -- Jos van Kan registered Linux user #152704

On Tuesday 18 October 2005 16:38, Carlos E. R. wrote:

The Tuesday 2005-10-18 at 14:37 +0100, Fergus Wilde wrote:

...

...

How can i erase this file (sen it to trash?).

$ cd

$ cd Desktop

$ su [give root password]

# rm -rf [name-of-your-directory]

Are you joking?

For a single file? As root? What if he mistypes and erases his whole disk?

-- Cheers, Carlos Robinson

Then he'd be a bit of doozie. The instructions will work just fine for erasing a directory, which is what he wanted to do. He'd be in /home/[him]/Desktop when he types rm, so he's going to have to type 'rm -rf / ' as a matter of policy in order to wipe the disk. With luck like that he's not going to live long enough to worry about his disk. -- Fergus Wilde Chetham's Library Long Millgate Manchester M3 1SB UK Tel: 0161 834 7961 Fax: 0161 839 5797 http://www.chethams.org.uk