Delete folder and all files/subdirectories

Question

How can I delete a folder with all it\'s files/subdirectories (recursive deletion) in C++?

Answer 1

You can use boost::remove_all from Boost.Filesystem.

Answer 2

Seriously:

system( "rm -rf /path/to/directory" )

Perhaps more what you're looking for, but unix specific:

/* Implement system( "rm -rf" ) */

#include <stdlib.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <sys/syslimits.h>
#include <ftw.h>


/* Call unlink or rmdir on the path, as appropriate. */
int
rm( const char *path, const struct stat *s, int flag, struct FTW *f )
{
    int status;
    int (*rm_func)( const char * );

    switch( flag ) {
    default:     rm_func = unlink; break;
    case FTW_DP: rm_func = rmdir;
    }
    if( status = rm_func( path ), status != 0 )
        perror( path );
    else
        puts( path );
    return status;
}


int
main( int argc, char **argv )
{
    while( *++argv ) {
        if( nftw( *argv, rm, OPEN_MAX, FTW_DEPTH )) {
            perror( *argv );
            return EXIT_FAILURE;
        }
    }
    return EXIT_SUCCESS;
}

Answer 3

Standard C++ provides no means of doing this - you will have to use operating system specific code or a cross-platform library such as Boost.

Answer 4

Since C++17 the prefered answer to this would be to use

std::filesystem::remove_all(const std::filesystem::path& folder)

which deletes the content of the folder recursively and then finally deletes the folder, according to this.

Answer 5

You can use ftw(), nftw(), readdir(), readdir_r() to traverse a directory and delete files recursively.
But since neither ftw(), nftw(), readdir() is thread-safe, I'll recommend readdir_r() instead if your program runs in a multi-threaded environment.