DEL — Delete files

Synopsis

DEL [/?] [/A[+|-]drash] [/S[+|-]drash] [/OLDSRCDIR[+|-]] [/E/X/Z/W/P/F/U/N/Q[+|-]] Filespecs…

Options

/?

Display command syntax information.

/A

Select files by attribute.

/S

Recurse into subdirectories.

/E

Do not display non-fatal error messages.

/N

Simulate execution.

/U

Do not display summary information.

/Q

Operate quietly.

/X

Delete any empty directories

/Z

Override the read-only attribute on files.

Normally, attempting to delete files with this attribute is an error.

/W

Wipe each file before deleting it, by writing zero to every byte of the file.

/F

Prevent the file from being undeleted with the UNDELETE command.

/P

Prompt for the deletion of individual files.

/K

Do not prompt if a "*" wildcard is used.

/OLDSRCDIR

Duplicate quirks of the 16-bit CMD supplied with IBM OS/2 with respect to source names.

Description

The DEL command deletes all files that match the search wildcards given as its arguments.

The DEL command first processes the contents of the CMD_DEL_INIT environment variable, if it has inherited one, as if it were a command tail, before processing any of the command tails that have been passed to it. This allows one to modify default options globally. (One can use command aliases or wrapper scripts to achieve the same effect.)

DEL explicitly ignores the names "." and ".." if they are matched by a search wildcard, and will not attempt to delete them (since that operation will always fail).

Related commands

COPYPLUS COPYSTD MORE MOVE RENAME DESCRIBE TRUENAME TYPE