File::Path - create or remove directory trees
mkpath(['/foo/bar/baz', 'blurfl/quux'], 1, 0711);
rmtree(['foo/bar/baz', 'blurfl/quux'], 1, 1);
The C<mkpath> function provides a convenient way to create directories, even
if your C<mkdir> kernel call won't create more than one level of directory at
a time. C<mkpath> takes three arguments:
the name of the path to create, or a reference
to a list of paths to create,
a boolean value, which if TRUE will cause C<mkpath>
to print the name of each directory as it is created
the numeric mode to use when creating the directories
(defaults to 0777), to be modified by the current umask.
It returns a list of all directories (including intermediates, determined
using the Unix '/' separator) created.
If a system error prevents a directory from being created, then the
C<mkpath> function throws a fatal error with C<Carp::croak>. This error
can be trapped with an C<eval> block:
print "Couldn't create $dir: $@";
Similarly, the C<rmtree> function provides a convenient way to delete a
subtree from the directory structure, much like the Unix command C<rm -r>.
C<rmtree> takes three arguments:
the root of the subtree to delete, or a reference to
a list of roots. All of the files and directories
below each root, as well as the roots themselves,
a boolean value, which if TRUE will cause C<rmtree> to
print a message each time it examines a file, giving the
name of the file, and indicating whether it's using C<rmdir>
or C<unlink> to remove it, or that it's skipping it.
a boolean value, which if TRUE will cause C<rmtree> to
skip any files to which you do not have delete access
(if running under VMS) or write access (if running
under another OS). This will change in the future when
a criterion for 'delete permission' under OSs other
than VMS is settled. (defaults to FALSE)
It returns the number of files successfully deleted. Symlinks are
simply deleted and not followed.
B<NOTE:> There are race conditions internal to the implementation of
C<rmtree> making it unsafe to use on directory trees which may be
altered or moved while C<rmtree> is running, and in particular on any
directory trees with any path components or subdirectories potentially
writable by untrusted users.
Additionally, if the third parameter is not TRUE and C<rmtree> is
interrupted, it may leave files and directories with permissions altered
to allow deletion (and older versions of this module would even set
files and directories to world-read/writable!)
Note also that the occurrence of errors in C<rmtree> can be determined I<only>
by trapping diagnostic messages using C<$SIG{__WARN__}>; it is not apparent
On Windows, if C<mkpath> gives you the warning: B<No such file or
directory>, this may mean that you've exceeded your filesystem's
Tim Bunce <F<Tim.Bunce@ig.co.uk>> and
Charles Bailey <F<bailey@newman.upenn.edu>>
our @ISA = qw( Exporter );
our @EXPORT = qw( mkpath rmtree );
my $Is_VMS = $^O
eq 'VMS';
my $Is_MacOS = $^O
eq 'MacOS';
# These OSes complain if you want to remove a file that you have no
my $force_writeable = ($^O
eq 'os2' || $^O
eq 'dos' || $^O
eq 'MSWin32' ||
$^O
eq 'amigaos' || $^O
eq 'MacOS' || $^O
eq 'epoc');
my($paths, $verbose, $mode) = @_;
# $paths -- either a path string or ref to list of paths
# $verbose -- optional print "mkdir $path" for each directory created
# $mode -- optional permissions, defaults to 0777
local($")=$Is_MacOS ? ":" : "/";
$mode = 0777 unless defined($mode);
$paths = [$paths] unless ref $paths;
foreach $path (@$paths) {
$path .= '/' if $^O eq 'os2' and $path =~ /^\w:\z/s; # feature of CRT
# Logic wants Unix paths, so go with the flow.
$path = VMS::Filespec::unixify($path);
if ($path =~ m:^(/[^/]+)/?\z:) {
my $parent = File::Basename::dirname($path);
unless (-d $parent or $path eq $parent) {
push(@created,mkpath($parent, $verbose, $mode));
print "mkdir $path\n" if $verbose;
unless (mkdir($path,$mode)) {
# allow for another process to have created it meanwhile
$! = $e, croak ("mkdir $path: $e") unless -d $path;
my($roots, $verbose, $safe) = @_;
if ( defined($roots) && length($roots) ) {
$roots = [$roots] unless ref $roots;
carp "No root path
(s
) specified
\n";
foreach $root (@{$roots}) {
$root = ":$root" if $root !~ /:/;
$root =~ s#([^:])\z#$1:#;
(undef, undef, my $rp) = lstat $root or next;
$rp &= 07777; # don't forget setuid, setgid, sticky bits
# notabene: 0700 is for making readable in the first place,
# it's also intended to change it to writable in case we have
# to recurse in which case we are better than rm -rf for
# subtrees with strange permissions
chmod($rp | 0700, ($Is_VMS ? VMS::Filespec::fileify($root) : $root))
or carp "Can
't make directory $root read+writeable: $!"
if (opendir my $d, $root) {
if (!defined ${"\cTAINT"} or ${"\cTAINT"}) {
# Blindly untaint dir names
@files = map { /^(.*)$/s ; $1 } readdir $d;
carp "Can't
read $root: $!";
# Deleting large numbers of files from VMS Files-11 filesystems
# is faster if done in reverse ASCIIbetical order
@files = reverse @files if $Is_VMS;
($root = VMS::Filespec::unixify($root)) =~ s#\.dir\z## if $Is_VMS;
@files = map("$root$_", @files);
@files = map("$root/$_", grep $_!~/^\
.{1,2}\z
/s
,@files);
$count += rmtree
(\
@files,$verbose,$safe);
($Is_VMS ?
!&VMS
::Filespec
::candelete
($root) : !-w
$root)) {
print "skipped $root\n" if $verbose;
or carp
"Can't make directory $root writeable: $!"
print "rmdir $root\n" if $verbose;
carp
"Can't remove directory $root: $!";
chmod($rp, ($Is_VMS ? VMS
::Filespec
::fileify
($root) : $root))
or carp
("and can't restore permissions to "
. sprintf("0%o",$rp) . "\n");
($Is_VMS ?
!&VMS
::Filespec
::candelete
($root)
: !(-l
$root || -w
$root)))
print "skipped $root\n" if $verbose;
or carp
"Can't make file $root writeable: $!"
print "unlink $root\n" if $verbose;
# delete all versions under VMS
carp
"Can't unlink file $root: $!";
or carp
("and can't restore permissions to "
. sprintf("0%o",$rp) . "\n");
last unless $Is_VMS && lstat $root;