Quickly Delete Large Directory from the Command line

When deleting a large directory from the command line, it can take a frustratingly long time for the task to complete. This is a trick I use to speed things up.

For example, if I want to delete the node_modules directory from the current directory historically I would run the following slow command.

# Slow
rm -rf node_modules

It is much faster to break this into two steps:

mv node_modules delme
rm -rf delme &

Explanation of Steps

1. Move the Directory

First, I rename the directory to delme. This is very fast and allows me to recreate the node_modules directory.

mv node_modules delme

2. Delete the Directory in the background

By adding an ampersand (&) to the end of a command, the command runs in the background.

rm -rf delme &

This command is still a slow command, but since it is running in the background you can continue working.

Sal Ferrarello (@salcode)

Sal is a PHP developer with a focus on the WordPress platform. He is a conference speaker with a background including Piano Player, Radio DJ, Magician/Juggler, Beach Photographer, and High School Math Teacher. Sal can be found professionally at WebDevStudios, where he works as a senior backend engineer.