All of us know that 'rm' is a critical command -- more for the system administrators. One can alias this command as 'rm -i', which makes file removing interactive. But this may not be true on all the systems where you work. Here is another way to protect your important directories form the havoc of the 'rm *' command. 'cd' to that directory and create a file '-i' For example:
$ cd imp_files ( like cd /etc )
$ > -i
$
When you give command:
$ rm *
it is interpreted as:
$ rm -i file1 file2 ... and so on as collecting sequence says that '-' preceeds alphabets.
I hope all Unix users find this useful.
$ cd imp_directory
$ > -i
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Michael S. Mimoso, Editorial DirectorThis was first published in December 2002