[CentOS] ls and rm: "argument list too long"
Les Mikesell
lesmikesell at gmail.com
Sat Oct 18 02:11:57 UTC 2008
thad wrote:
> Satchel Paige - "Don't look back. Something might be gaining on you."
>
>
> On Fri, Oct 17, 2008 at 4:36 AM, Laurent Wandrebeck
> <l.wandrebeck at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 2008/10/17 Jussi Hirvi <greenspot at greenspot.fi>:
>>> Since when is there a limit in how long directory listings CentOS can show
>>> (ls), or how large directories can be removed (rm). It is really annoying to
>>> say, for example
>>>
>>> rm -rf /var/amavis/tmp
>>>
>>> and get only "argument list too long" as feedback.
>>>
>>> Is there a way to go round this problem?
>>>
>>> I have CentOS 5.2.
>>>
>>> - Jussi
>> try something like:
>> for i in /var/amavis/tmp/*
>> do
>> rm -rf $i
>> done
>
> it should be:
>
> for i in `ls /var/amavis/tmp`
> do
> rm $i
> done
These shouldn't make any difference. The limit is on the size of the
expanded shell command line. The original example won't cause it. The
ones that expand a list with a * or the output of ls may. The right
solution is to let rm recurse with -r or to potentially long list to xargs.
--
Les Mikesell
lesmikesell at gmail.com
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