Additionally, the second parameter $deleteFilesStartingWithFilename defines whether to do a regular expression match against all files contained in the base folder and any subfolders contained in it.įor instance, a call with $filepath=’/path/file.png’ with $deleteFilesStartingWithFilename=true will delete all files starting with “file”, such as “file_1.png” or “fileX.jpg”.Ĭaution: At the moment it ignores the extension when using $deleteFilesStartingWithFilename=true, so it will also delete file.JPG when $filepath=’/path/file.PNG’. The following function recursively deletes all occurrences of files matching the filename specified by an absolute path ($filepath).

In order to automatically also delete these resized versions the base folder needs to be parsed recursively to delete all matching files contained. Finally, let’s say that these dimensions are part of the original filename, such as original_300x150.png and original_150x75.png. Furthermore, imagine the case that there exist multiple different thumbnail dimension formats, such as 300×150 and 150×75. These versions are kept inside subfolders names resized, thumbnails and icons respecively. For instance imagine the case when you want to delete an image that exists in multiple versions, such as the original, a thumbnail and an icon version. In case we fail we return false, We use the false to stop the recursive call.Sometimes it is nice to be able to recursively delete specific files in folder structures using PHP. We also need a to define the final statement in our case the lowest possible solution is deleting a single file:

While(false != ($entry = readdir($handle))) PHP recursively manipulate directories, recursively escape parameters Recursively delete folders and traverse print folders Recursively delete folders Own code: Teacher's code: Recursively print all contents of a folder. So here is my recursive directory delete function: The function itself requires two parameters, the first being the full path to the directory that your wish to clear out, and the second being a simple TRUE/FALSE that controls whether or not the function needs to try and delete the folder it is trying to clean or simple empty its contents. Well today I needed to delete folders but I needed something robust that handled errors better than what I was able to find. PHP for all it’s wonderful things can’t delete a non-empty folder. Every time I have to delete a folder I looked it up in google and used the first code that would sort of work.

Php delete folder contents recursively