PHP Functions for Recursively Deleting Files and Directories

Sometimes you need to use PHP to delete files and directories; PHP offers built‑in functions for this purpose, and the following code snippets illustrate how to perform recursive deletions.

<?php
function deldir($dir) {
  // First delete files in the directory:
  $dh = opendir($dir);
  while ($file = readdir($dh)) {
    if ($file != "." && $file != "..") {
      $fullpath = $dir . "/" . $file;
      if (!is_dir($fullpath)) {
        unlink($fullpath);
      } else {
        deldir($fullpath);
      }
    }
  }
  closedir($dh);
  // Delete the current folder:
  if (rmdir($dir)) {
    return true;
  } else {
    return false;
  }
}
?>

The unlink() function deletes a file and returns true on success or false on failure; the rmdir() function removes an empty directory, which must be empty and have appropriate permissions.

Example: delete all ".svn" folders (including their contents) under a given directory.

<?php
function delsvn($dir) {
  $dh = opendir($dir);
  // Find all ".svn" folders:
  while ($file = readdir($dh)) {
    if ($file != "." && $file != "..") {
      $fullpath = $dir . "/" . $file;
      if (is_dir($fullpath)) {
        if ($file == ".svn") {
          delsvndir($fullpath);
        } else {
          delsvn($fullpath);
        }
      }
    }
  }
  closedir($dh);
}

function delsvndir($svndir) {
  // First delete files in the directory:
  $dh = opendir($svndir);
  while ($file = readdir($dh)) {
    if ($file != "." && $file != "..") {
      $fullpath = $svndir . "/" . $file;
      if (is_dir($fullpath)) {
        delsvndir($fullpath);
      } else {
        unlink($fullpath);
      }
    }
  }
  closedir($dh);
  // Delete the directory itself:
  if (rmdir($svndir)) {
    return true;
  } else {
    return false;
  }
}

$dir = dirname(__FILE__);
// echo $dir;
 delsvn($dir);
?>

At the end of the article, several recommended learning resources for PHP, Vue, Laravel, Swoole, and related technologies are listed.