1UNLINK(2) Linux Programmer's Manual UNLINK(2)
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6 unlink - delete a name and possibly the file it refers to
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9 #include <unistd.h>
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11 int unlink(const char *pathname);
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14 unlink() deletes a name from the file system. If that name was the
15 last link to a file and no processes have the file open the file is
16 deleted and the space it was using is made available for reuse.
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18 If the name was the last link to a file but any processes still have
19 the file open the file will remain in existence until the last file
20 descriptor referring to it is closed.
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22 If the name referred to a symbolic link the link is removed.
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24 If the name referred to a socket, fifo or device the name for it is
25 removed but processes which have the object open may continue to use
26 it.
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29 On success, zero is returned. On error, -1 is returned, and errno is
30 set appropriately.
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33 EACCES Write access to the directory containing pathname is not allowed
34 for the process's effective UID, or one of the directories in
35 pathname did not allow search permission. (See also path_reso‐
36 lution(7).)
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38 EBUSY (not on Linux)
39 The file pathname cannot be unlinked because it is being used by
40 the system or another process and the implementation considers
41 this an error.
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43 EFAULT pathname points outside your accessible address space.
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45 EIO An I/O error occurred.
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47 EISDIR pathname refers to a directory. (This is the non-POSIX value
48 returned by Linux since 2.1.132.)
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50 ELOOP Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating path‐
51 name.
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53 ENAMETOOLONG
54 pathname was too long.
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56 ENOENT A component in pathname does not exist or is a dangling symbolic
57 link, or pathname is empty.
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59 ENOMEM Insufficient kernel memory was available.
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61 ENOTDIR
62 A component used as a directory in pathname is not, in fact, a
63 directory.
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65 EPERM The system does not allow unlinking of directories, or unlinking
66 of directories requires privileges that the calling process
67 doesn't have. (This is the POSIX prescribed error return; as
68 noted above, Linux returns EISDIR for this case.)
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70 EPERM (Linux only)
71 The file system does not allow unlinking of files.
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73 EPERM or EACCES
74 The directory containing pathname has the sticky bit (S_ISVTX)
75 set and the process's effective UID is neither the UID of the
76 file to be deleted nor that of the directory containing it, and
77 the process is not privileged (Linux: does not have the
78 CAP_FOWNER capability).
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80 EROFS pathname refers to a file on a read-only file system.
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83 SVr4, 4.3BSD, POSIX.1-2001.
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86 Infelicities in the protocol underlying NFS can cause the unexpected
87 disappearance of files which are still being used.
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90 rm(1), chmod(2), link(2), mknod(2), open(2), rename(2), rmdir(2),
91 unlinkat(2), mkfifo(3), remove(3), path_resolution(7), symlink(7)
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94 This page is part of release 3.22 of the Linux man-pages project. A
95 description of the project, and information about reporting bugs, can
96 be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.
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100Linux 2004-06-23 UNLINK(2)