Name
del or erase
Synopsis
Delete one or more files.
Syntax
del [/p] [/f] [/s] [/q] [/a:attributes
]filename
erase [/p] [/f] [/s] [/q] [/a:attributes
]filename
Description
The del
command is used to delete one or more
files from the command line without sending them to the Recycle Bin.
The del
options are:
-
filename
Specifies the file(s) to delete. If you do not specify the drive or path, the file is assumed to be in the current directory. You can use standard
*
and?
wildcards to specify the files to delete.-
/p
Prompts for confirmation before deleting each file.
-
/f
Forces deletion of read-only files.
-
/s
Delete specified files in all subdirectories (when using wildcards).
-
/q
Quiet mode; do not prompt if
filename
is*.*
.-
/a
:attributes
Selects files to delete based on attributes (read-only, hidden, system, or archive). See “Attrib” in Chapter 4 for more information on attributes.
Examples
Delete the file myfile.txt
in the current
directory:
C:\>del myfile.txt
Delete the file myfile.txt
in the
c:\files
directory:
C:\>del c:\files\myfile.txt
Delete all files with the pattern myfile
.*
(e.g., myfile.doc
,
myfile.txt
, etc.) in the current directory, but
prompt for each deletion:
C:\>del c:\files\myfile.* /p
Notes
The
del
anderase
commands are functionally identical.Using the
del
command to delete a file does not move it to the Recycle Bin. In other words, you can’t get a file back once you use thedel
command, unless you have a special “unerase” disk recovery utility.
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