Delete directory and all symlinks recursively

Question

I tried to use shutil to delete a directory and all contained files, as follows:

import shutil
from os.path import exists
if exists(path_dir):
    shutil.rmtree(path_dir)

Unfortunately, my solution does not work, throwing the following error:

FileNotFoundError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: '._image1.jpg'

A quick search showed that I'm not alone in having this problem. In my understanding, the rmtree function is equivalent to the rm -Rf $DIR shell command - but this doesn't seem to be the case.

p.s. for reconstruction purposes. Please create a symbolic link for example using ln -s /path/to/original /path/to/link

Answer 1

That is strange, I have no issues with shutil.rmtree() with or without symlink under the folder to be deleted, both in windows 10 and Ubuntu 20.04.2 LTS.

Anyhow try the following code. I tried it in windows 10 and Ubuntu.

from pathlib import Path
import shutil


def delete_dir_recursion(p):
    """
    Delete folder, sub-folders and files.
    """
    for f in p.glob('**/*'):
        if f.is_symlink():
            f.unlink(missing_ok=True)  # missing_ok is added in python 3.8
            print(f'symlink {f.name} from path {f} was deleted')
        elif f.is_file():
            f.unlink()
            print(f'file: {f.name} from path {f} was deleted')
        elif f.is_dir():
            try:
                f.rmdir()  # delete empty sub-folder
                print(f'folder: {f.name} from path {f} was deleted')
            except OSError:  # sub-folder is not empty
                delete_dir_recursion(f)  # recurse the current sub-folder
            except Exception as exception:  # capture other exception
                print(f'exception name: {exception.__class__.__name__}')
                print(f'exception msg: {exception}')

    try:
        p.rmdir()  # time to delete an empty folder
        print(f'folder: {p.name} from path {p} was deleted')
    except NotADirectoryError:
        p.unlink()  # delete folder even if it is a symlink, linux
        print(f'symlink folder: {p.name} from path {p} was deleted')
    except Exception as exception:
        print(f'exception name: {exception.__class__.__name__}')
        print(f'exception msg: {exception}')


def delete_dir(folder):
    p = Path(folder)

    if not p.exists():
        print(f'The path {p} does not exists!')
        return

    # Attempt to delete the whole folder at once.
    try:
        shutil.rmtree(p)
    except Exception as exception:
        print(f'exception name: {exception.__class__.__name__}')
        print(f'exception msg: {exception}')
        # continue parsing the folder
    else:  # else if no issues on rmtree()
        if not p.exists():  # verify
            print(f'folder {p} was successfully deleted by shutil.rmtree!')
            return

    print(f'Parse the folder {folder} ...')
    delete_dir_recursion(p)

    if not p.exists():  # verify
        print(f'folder {p} was successfully deleted!')

# start
folder_to_delete = '/home/zz/tmp/sample/b'  # delete folder b
delete_dir(folder_to_delete)

Sample output:

We are going to delete the folder b.

.
├── 1.txt
├── a
├── b
│   ├── 1
│   ├── 1.txt -> ../1.txt
│   ├── 2
│   │   └── 21
│   │       └── 21.txt
│   ├── 3
│   │   └── 31
│   ├── 4
│   │   └── c -> ../../c
│   ├── a -> ../a
│   └── b.txt
├── c

Parse the folder /home/zz/tmp/sample/b ...
symlink a from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/a was deleted
symlink c from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/4/c was deleted
folder: 4 from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/4 was deleted
symlink 1.txt from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/1.txt was deleted
file: b.txt from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/b.txt was deleted
file: 21.txt from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/2/21/21.txt was deleted
folder: 21 from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/2/21 was deleted
folder: 2 from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/2 was deleted
folder: 1 from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/1 was deleted
folder: 31 from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/3/31 was deleted
folder: 3 from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b/3 was deleted
folder: b from path /home/zz/tmp/sample/b was deleted
folder /home/zz/tmp/sample/b was successfully deleted!