My Original Question was as follows
> I have a file in particular sendmail with the following permissions
>
> -r-sr-x--x and I can't seem to delete this file even as root because it
> says the file not found...
>
Thanx to the following people in no particular for their suggestions
Geoff Weller weller@larc.nasa.gov
Marc L. Herbert, Ph.D. marc.herbert@lmco.com
Adam Forsyth forsytad@martin.luther.edu
Matt Massie massie@npg.wustl.edu
Jack Goldsmith jackg@calfp.com
Matthew Stier Matthew.Stier@tddny.fujitsu.com
Daniel T Pigg piggd@colltech.com
Andrew M Townsend ATOWNSEND@DOLETA.GOV
foster@bial1.ucsd.edu
Igor Schein igor@txc.com
Ian Wallace iwallace@bcoe.bm
Ackerson, Greg ackerson_ga@nns.com
HCDEB@mead.com
Robert.Harris@gwl.com
Charlie Mengler charliem@anchorchips.com
Solutions and other questions in no particular order:
1. RTFM
2. The file might have non-printing characters in the file name, which means
the name must be enclosed in quotes (")
--> I checked this way not very helpful but was a good start
3. try: chmod o+w <filename> / rm <filename>
--> I tried this and it wouldnt let me.
4. Is this file a symbolic link pointing to a file that no longer exists?
--> No this was not a symbolic link. this is what I 1st thought but it
turned out to be
--> an SUID, SGID on futher digging
5. Did you do an fsck?
--> didnt want to do this on a production machine during working hours.
6. The filename may contain control character.
Try doing an "ls | od -c". This should give you a hint if it has one or
not.
To remove one that does, use wild cards to replace the control character.
Use "rm -i <filename with wildcards>" if you can't get a wild card pattern
to isolate the problem filename. (The answer Y or N to delete or not delete
the file.)
--> This helped greatly. it pointed me in the correct direction..
7. Try carefully doing a wildcard rm / rm -i * or rm -i int* you get the
idea.
SORTA along the same premise as #6
8. You should be able to delete the file using the file manager. Open file
manager, then click on the oddly named file, and delete it.
--> I didnt think of doing it this way .. but by the time I figured it out
it was too late to use
--> the file manager ... but will try it next time ( but hopfully no next
time will occur )
9. Change the permissions of the file first.
--> I tried chmod 4777 , chmod 0000 , chmod 2777 etc....
--> but to no avail..
10. Do ls -b on that file, chances are it has unprintable characters in it.
11. do an ls -q to verify you have all the filename
12. chmod 777 foo.bar / rm foo.bar
--> see #9
--- Thanx once again this has proven to be a helpful list ...
-- rick
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : Fri Sep 28 2001 - 23:12:43 CDT