rmdir - Remove Directory

Syntax

#include <direct.h>
int rmdir(char *pathname);

rmdir deletes the directory specified by pathname. The directory must be empty, and it must not be the current working directory or the root directory.

Note: In earlier releases of C Set ++, rmdir began with an underscore (_rmdir). Because it is defined by the X/Open standard, the underscore has been removed. For compatibility, The Developer's Toolkit will map _rmdir to rmdir for you.

rmdir returns the value 0 if the directory is successfully deleted. A return value of -1 indicates an error, and errno is set to one of the following values:

Value

Meaning

The given path name is not a directory.
The directory is not empty.
The directory is read only.
The directory is the current working directory or root directory being used by a process.

The path name was not found.

This example deletes two directories: one in the root directory, and the other in the current working directory.

#include <stdio.h>#include <direct.h>
#include <string.h>

int main(void)
{
   char *dir1,*dir2;

 /*  Create the directory "aleng" in the root directory of the C: drive.      */

   dir1 = "c:\\aleng";
   if (0 == (mkdir(dir1)))
      printf("%s directory was created.\n", dir1);
   else
      printf("%s directory was not created.\n", dir1);

 /*  Create the subdirectory "simon" in the current directory.                */

   dir2 = "simon";
   if (0 == (mkdir(dir2)))
      printf("%s directory was created.\n", dir2);
   else
      printf("%s directory was not created.\n", dir2);

 /*  Remove the directory "aleng" from the root directory of the C: drive.    */

   printf("Removing directory 'aleng' from the root directory.\n");
   if (rmdir(dir1))
      perror(NULL);
   else
      printf("%s directory was removed.\n", dir1);

 /*  Remove the subdirectory "simon" from the current directory.              */

   printf("Removing subdirectory 'simon' from the current directory.\n");
   if (rmdir(dir2))
      perror(NULL);
   else
      printf("%s directory was removed.\n", dir2);
   return 0;

   /****************************************************************************
      The output should be:

      c:\aleng directory was created.
      simon directory was created.
      Removing directory 'aleng' from the root directory.
      c:\aleng directory was removed.
      Removing subdirectory 'simon' from the current directory.
      simon directory was removed.
   ****************************************************************************/
}

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