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I have a couple of files that I can't remove:
> rm foo
> rm: cannot remove 'foo': File exists
basically I also get the same error if I try to mv the file, chmod it or even if I try to cat it.
To me this error confuses me. I think there may be many valid reasons why you can't do this and that with a file, but the file existing should not be a reason to fail removing it or do the other things.
What is actually going on here? Is there some other windows error that maps to EEXISTS in a confusing way or what?
skyking
Posted 2017-10-12T08:32:34.550
Reputation: 141
1That's a confusing message, alright. Cygwin provides its own version of
stracewhich shows the Windows system calls used to run a command. To get more information on what's happening, you could install it and try running thermcommand through that. – Anthony Geoghegan – 2017-10-12T09:11:56.163@AnthonyGeoghegan Thanks for the tip, it looks like
ERROR_FILE_CORRUPTis translated toEEXISTwhich is confusing at least in this case at least. I wonder what the scenario that was in their mind when they mapped it that way. – skyking – 2017-10-12T09:39:35.4371That sounds wrong to me - but there may be a good reason for it (e.g., no POSIX equivalent for a corrupted file error code). It might be worth raising the issue on their mailing list to get clarification on it. I'd also suggest that you put your findings into an answer (and accept it) so that it could help others in a similar situation. – Anthony Geoghegan – 2017-10-12T09:57:59.113