Debian Bug report logs - #270967
gconf2-common fails to purge when /etc isn't removable

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Message #5 received at submit@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: Klaus Ethgen <Klaus@Ethgen.de>

To: Debian Bug Tracking System <submit@bugs.debian.org>

Subject: gconf2 try's to remove /etc completely when purging

Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 11:45:04 +0200

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

Package: gconf2
Version: 2.6.3-2
Severity: critical

When removing (purging) gconf2 it trys to remove /etc c ompletely!

This will destroy the whole system if /etc can be removed on it and is not
protected as on my system.

- -- System Information:
Debian Release: 3.1
  APT prefers testing
  APT policy: (800, 'testing'), (70, 'unstable')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Kernel: Linux 2.4.27
Locale: LANG=de_DE, LC_CTYPE=de_DE (ignored: LC_ALL set to de_DE)

Versions of packages gconf2 depends on:
ii  libatk1.0-0                 1.6.1-3      The ATK accessibility toolkit
ii  libc6                       2.3.2.ds1-13 GNU C Library: Shared libraries an
pn  libgconf2-4                              Not found.
ii  libglib2.0-0                2.4.6-2      The GLib library of C routines
ii  libgtk2.0-0                 2.4.9-1      The GTK+ graphical user interface 
ii  liborbit2                   1:2.10.2-1.1 libraries for ORBit2 - a CORBA ORB
ii  libpango1.0-0               1.4.1-2      Layout and rendering of internatio
ii  libpopt0                    1.7-4        lib for parsing cmdline parameters
ii  libxml2                     2.6.11-3     GNOME XML library
ii  zlib1g                      1:1.2.1.1-5  compression library - runtime

- -- no debconf information
- -- 
Klaus Ethgen                            http://www.ethgen.de/
pub  2048R/D1A4EDE5 2000-02-26 Klaus Ethgen <Klaus@Ethgen.de>
Fingerprint: D7 67 71 C4 99 A6 D4 FE  EA 40 30 57 3C 88 26 2B
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Message #10 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: Sebastien Bacher <seb128@debian.org>

To: Klaus Ethgen <Klaus@Ethgen.de>, 270967@bugs.debian.org

Cc: control@bugs.debian.org

Subject: Re: Bug#270967: gconf2 try's to remove /etc completely when purging

Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 12:47:05 +0200

severity 270967 important
tag 270967 + unreproducible moreinfo
thanks

Le vendredi 10 septembre 2004 à 11:45 +0200, Klaus Ethgen a écrit :

> When removing (purging) gconf2 it trys to remove /etc c ompletely!
> 
> This will destroy the whole system if /etc can be removed on it and is not
> protected as on my system.

Hi, 

Could you provide some details ? Are you sure that the /etc dir has been
deleted by gconf2 ?

The postrm command used on purge is:
"rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty /etc/gconf/2" ... this only removes
empty dirs, /etc was empty on your box ? 

I'm changing the severity to important for the moment, this problem is
not reproducible.


Thanks,

Sebastien Bacher

Message #19 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: Klaus Ethgen <Klaus@Ethgen.de>

To: Sebastien Bacher <seb128@debian.org>

Cc: 270967@bugs.debian.org, control@bugs.debian.org

Subject: Re: Bug#270967: gconf2 try's to remove /etc completely when purging

Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 13:26:05 +0200

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

Hi,

Am Fr den 10. Sep 2004 um 12:47 schriebst Du:
> Could you provide some details ? Are you sure that the /etc dir has been
> deleted by gconf2 ?

When I purged the package first it failed because /etc/gconf/2 was not found on
my system and then after I created it it prints:
rmdir: `/etc': Permission denied
when purging. /etc is not removable in my environment thank goodnes.

I did not check if it whould remove /etc if it whould be removable.

> "rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty /etc/gconf/2" ... this only removes
> empty dirs, /etc was empty on your box ? 

No, but see above.

Hmm.. I didn't look to the postrm afterwards. I only did a
echo "#!/bin/sh" > /var/lib/dpkg/info/gconf2.postrm
to remove it completely. But it is strange that the rmdir above give this
message.

Regards
   Klaus
- -- 
Klaus Ethgen                            http://www.ethgen.de/
pub  2048R/D1A4EDE5 2000-02-26 Klaus Ethgen <Klaus@Ethgen.de>
Fingerprint: D7 67 71 C4 99 A6 D4 FE  EA 40 30 57 3C 88 26 2B
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Message #24 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: Sebastien Bacher <seb128@debian.org>

To: Klaus Ethgen <Klaus@Ethgen.de>

Cc: 270967@bugs.debian.org

Subject: Re: Bug#270967: gconf2 try's to remove /etc completely when purging

Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 13:41:46 +0200

Le vendredi 10 septembre 2004 à 13:26 +0200, Klaus Ethgen a écrit :

> When I purged the package first it failed because /etc/gconf/2 was not found on
> my system and then after I created it it prints:
> rmdir: `/etc': Permission denied
> when purging. /etc is not removable in my environment thank goodnes.

You've purged only this one ? Do you remember which version of the
package it was ?

I've just tried in a fresh pbuilder, no problem ...


> I did not check if it whould remove /etc if it whould be removable.

Can you still reproduce the problem ?


> to remove it completely. But it is strange that the rmdir above give this
> message.

Yes, I don't understand where is the problem, but that's not a gconf
problem ... if "rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty /etc/gconf/2" wants
to remove /etc you have a problem but that with coreutils, not gconf.


Cheers,

Sebastien Bacher

Message #29 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: Klaus Ethgen <Klaus@Ethgen.de>

To: Sebastien Bacher <seb128@debian.org>

Cc: 270967@bugs.debian.org

Subject: Re: Bug#270967: gconf2 try's to remove /etc completely when purging

Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 13:56:39 +0200

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

Hi,

Am Fr den 10. Sep 2004 um 13:41 schriebst Du:
> You've purged only this one ? Do you remember which version of the
> package it was ?

No. But see below...

> Can you still reproduce the problem ?

Yes, I did on a other host (sid, newest version, all my hosts have "chattr +i /").
- ---
xxxx:~# dpkg --force-all --purge gconf2
dpkg: gconf2: dependency problems, but removing anyway as you request:
 libgnome2-common depends on gconf2 (>= 2.6.0-1).
 libgnomevfs2-common depends on gconf2 (>= 2.6.0).
 libgconf2-4 depends on gconf2 (>= 2.6.4-2).
(Reading database ... 94571 files and directories currently installed.)
Removing gconf2 ...
Purging configuration files for gconf2 ...
rmdir: `/etc': Permission denied
dpkg: error processing gconf2 (--purge):
 subprocess post-removal script returned error exit status 1
Errors were encountered while processing:
 gconf2
- ---

When there is somethink inside of /etc/gconf then no problem. But when there is
nothing more inside this bug happens.

When I then recreate /etc/gconfd/2 and make a "chattr -i /" the purge work well
without erasing something from /etc.

As the /etc gets not really deleted, i think the severity can be lowered to
'normal'.

Regards
   Klaus
- -- 
Klaus Ethgen                            http://www.ethgen.de/
pub  2048R/D1A4EDE5 2000-02-26 Klaus Ethgen <Klaus@Ethgen.de>
Fingerprint: D7 67 71 C4 99 A6 D4 FE  EA 40 30 57 3C 88 26 2B
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Message #34 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: Sebastien Bacher <seb128@debian.org>

To: Klaus Ethgen <Klaus@Ethgen.de>

Cc: 270967@bugs.debian.org

Subject: Re: Bug#270967: gconf2 try's to remove /etc completely when purging

Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 15:00:12 +0200

Le vendredi 10 septembre 2004 à 13:56 +0200, Klaus Ethgen a écrit :

> Yes, I did on a other host (sid, newest version, all my hosts have "chattr +i /").

Ok, I've the problem too.

$ chattr +i / 
$ dpkg --purge libgconf2-4 gconf2

and I get the same error

The weird point is that running "sh /var/lib/dpkg/info/gconf2.postrm
purge" doesn't display any error, but the same line called by apt raises
an error ...

Anybody with an idea on this ?

BTW not a gconf problem ...


Thanks,

Sebastien Bacher

Message #39 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: Adrian Bunk <bunk@stusta.de>

To: Sebastien Bacher <seb128@debian.org>

Cc: 270967@bugs.debian.org, 270967-submitter@bugs.debian.org, control@bugs.debian.org

Subject: Why purging gconf2-common might erase your /etc

Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 03:23:35 +0100

severity 270967 critical
thanks

Hi Sebastien,

I think I can answer the following question you raised:

<--  snip  -->

The weird point is that running "sh /var/lib/dpkg/info/gconf2.postrm
purge" doesn't display any error, but the same line called by apt raises
an error ...

<--  snip  -->

The problem is only triggered when /etc/gconf2/ is empty.


cu
Adrian

-- 

       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

Message #49 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: Josselin Mouette <joss@debian.org>

To: Adrian Bunk <bunk@stusta.de>, 270967@bugs.debian.org

Cc: Klaus Ethgen <Klaus@Ethgen.de>, coreutils@packages.debian.org

Subject: Re: Bug#270967: Why purging gconf2-common might erase your /etc

Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 10:10:57 +0100

severity 270967 normal
clone 270967 -1
retitle 270967 gconf2-common fails to purge when /etc isn't removable
reassign -1 coreutils
retitle -1 rmdir should check emptiness before permissions
thanks

Le lundi 30 janvier 2006 à 03:23 +0100, Adrian Bunk a écrit :
> severity 270967 critical
> thanks

This is by no means a critical bug. There's no way this script can wipe
out your /etc.

> Hi Sebastien,
> 
> I think I can answer the following question you raised:
> 
> <--  snip  -->
> 
> The weird point is that running "sh /var/lib/dpkg/info/gconf2.postrm
> purge" doesn't display any error, but the same line called by apt raises
> an error ...
> 
> <--  snip  -->
> 
> The problem is only triggered when /etc/gconf2/ is empty.

This error message is triggered by rmdir trying to remove /etc.
Normally, rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty will try to
remove /etc/gconf/2, then /etc/gconf, then /etc, and will stop with /etc
because it isn't empty.

On your system, the chattr -i prevents the removal of /etc, and rmdir
fails on "permission denied" instead of "directory not empty".

I'd say that, so that rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty can work on
such systems, it should be made to check first if the directory is
empty, and then if it has the permissions to remove it. I'm creating a
clone report on coreutils, but maybe it is caused directly by the kernel
or libc - in which case it should still be possible to work around the
issue in coreutils.

Currently, rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty seems to do the following:
      * call rmdir(2)
      * check errno
      * ignore ENOTEMPTY
Maybe it could be modified to do the following:
      * check if the directory is empty
      * call rmdir(2)
I don't know whether this would be acceptable. Depending on the
coreutils maintainers' advice and decision, I will modify - or not - the
gconf2 scripts.

Regards,
-- 
 .''`.           Josselin Mouette        /\./\
: :' :           josselin.mouette@ens-lyon.org
`. `'                        joss@debian.org
   `-  Debian GNU/Linux -- The power of freedom

Message #60 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: bob@proulx.com (Bob Proulx)

To: 270967@bugs.debian.org

Subject: Re: Bug#270967: Why purging gconf2-common might erase your /etc

Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2008 10:39:49 -0700

Josselin Mouette wrote:
> This error message is triggered by rmdir trying to remove /etc.
> Normally, rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty will try to
> remove /etc/gconf/2, then /etc/gconf, then /etc, and will stop with /etc
> because it isn't empty.

I see in the gconf2-common.postrm that the following command is being
run:

        rm -f /etc/gconf/2/path
        rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty /etc/gconf/2

Can that instead be changed to the following so as to avoid trying to
remove /etc at all?

        rm -f /etc/gconf/2/path
        rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty /etc/gconf/2 /etc/gconf

It just seems simpler this way.

Meanwhile, I have removed the moreinfo and unreproducible tags and am
forwarding this upstream.

Bob

Message #65 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: bob@proulx.com (Bob Proulx)

To: 270967@bugs.debian.org

Subject: Re: Bug#270967: Why purging gconf2-common might erase your /etc

Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2008 10:52:11 -0700

> Meanwhile, I have removed the moreinfo and unreproducible tags and am
> forwarding this upstream.

Actually I am doing that to the cloned bug 350541.

Bob

Message #70 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: bob@proulx.com (Bob Proulx)

To: bug-coreutils@gnu.org, 270967@bugs.debian.org

Subject: rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty fails with permission denied

Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2008 10:58:29 -0700

Please maintain the CC to both the bug number and the mailing list
when responding.  Thanks.

Reported to the Debian BTS:

  http://bugs.debian.org/350541

'rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty' will ignore non-empty directories
unless it has insufficient permission to remove them, in which case it
fails.  Can rmdir avoid failing in this case?

Here is a way to reproduce the issue.  Root access is required in
order to have permission to set the immutable attribute.  The
filesystem needs to be ext2-like in order to support it.

  # mkdir testdir
  # mkdir testdir/foo
  # mkdir testdir/foo/bar
  # mkdir testdir/foo/boo
  # chattr +i testdir
  # rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty testdir/foo/bar ; echo $?
  rmdir: testdir/foo: Permission denied
  1

But without the immutable attribute:

  # chattr -i testdir
  # mkdir testdir/foo/bar
  # rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty testdir/foo/bar ; echo $?
  0

This was found in a package postrm script which tried to clean up by
doing the following:

  rm -f /etc/gconf/2/path
  rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty /etc/gconf/2
  rmdir: `/etc': Permission denied

Bob

----- Forwarded *TRIMMED* message from Josselin Mouette <joss@debian.org> -----

From: Josselin Mouette <joss@debian.org>
Subject: Bug#270967: Why purging gconf2-common might erase your /etc
Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 10:10:57 +0100

[...TRIMMED CONTENT, ORIGINAL IN ARCHIVE...]

This error message is triggered by rmdir trying to remove /etc.
Normally, rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty will try to
remove /etc/gconf/2, then /etc/gconf, then /etc, and will stop with /etc
because it isn't empty.

On your system, the chattr -i prevents the removal of /etc, and rmdir
fails on "permission denied" instead of "directory not empty".

I'd say that, so that rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty can work on
such systems, it should be made to check first if the directory is
empty, and then if it has the permissions to remove it. I'm creating a
clone report on coreutils, but maybe it is caused directly by the kernel
or libc - in which case it should still be possible to work around the
issue in coreutils.

Currently, rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty seems to do the following:
      * call rmdir(2)
      * check errno
      * ignore ENOTEMPTY
Maybe it could be modified to do the following:
      * check if the directory is empty
      * call rmdir(2)
I don't know whether this would be acceptable. Depending on the
coreutils maintainers' advice and decision, I will modify - or not - the
gconf2 scripts.

Regards,
-- 
 .''`.           Josselin Mouette        /\./\
: :' :           josselin.mouette@ens-lyon.org
`. `'                        joss@debian.org
   `-  Debian GNU/Linux -- The power of freedom

----- End forwarded message -----

Message #75 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: bob@proulx.com (Bob Proulx)

To: bug-coreutils@gnu.org, 350541@bugs.debian.org

Subject: Re: rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty fails with permission denied

Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2008 11:49:58 -0700

Bob Proulx wrote:
> Please maintain the CC to both the bug number and the mailing list
> when responding.  Thanks.

Which would have been great if I had not been confused by the cloning
of this bug into two different bugs.  My bad.  Please keep
350541@bugs.debian.org instead of 270967@bugs.debian.org in the CC
list.  Sorry about that.

> Reported to the Debian BTS:
> 
>   http://bugs.debian.org/350541

Bob

Message #80 received at 270967@bugs.debian.org (full text, mbox, reply):

From: Jim Meyering <jim@meyering.net>

To: bug-coreutils@gnu.org

Cc: 270967@bugs.debian.org

Subject: Re: rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty fails with permission denied

Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2008 13:58:15 +0100

bob@proulx.com (Bob Proulx) wrote:
> Please maintain the CC to both the bug number and the mailing list
> when responding.  Thanks.
>
> Reported to the Debian BTS:
>
>   http://bugs.debian.org/350541
>
> 'rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty' will ignore non-empty directories
> unless it has insufficient permission to remove them, in which case it
> fails.  Can rmdir avoid failing in this case?
>
> Here is a way to reproduce the issue.  Root access is required in
> order to have permission to set the immutable attribute.  The
> filesystem needs to be ext2-like in order to support it.
>
>   # mkdir testdir
>   # mkdir testdir/foo
>   # mkdir testdir/foo/bar
>   # mkdir testdir/foo/boo
>   # chattr +i testdir
>   # rmdir -p --ignore-fail-on-non-empty testdir/foo/bar ; echo $?
>   rmdir: testdir/foo: Permission denied
>   1

I've fixed it like this:
(but no test case yet -- volunteers welcome!)

	Improve "rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty"
	* src/rmdir.c (remove_parents, main): With --ignore-fail-on-non-empty,
	suppress a diagnostic also for e.g., EACCES, which can happen
	with read-only media or when the parent directory has the immutable
	attribute (set via chattr +i).
	(errno_may_be_empty, ignorable_failure): New functions.
	* src/remove.c (is_empty_dir): Move function to ...
	* src/system.h (is_empty_dir): ...here, and make it inline.
	Suggested by Josselin Mouette in <http://bugs.debian.org/363011>
	via Bob Proulx.
	* NEWS: Mention the improvement.

Signed-off-by: Jim Meyering <meyering@redhat.com>
---
 ChangeLog    |   14 ++++++++++++++
 NEWS         |   10 +++++++++-
 THANKS       |    1 +
 src/remove.c |   32 +-------------------------------
 src/rmdir.c  |   36 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++-----
 src/system.h |   30 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 6 files changed, 86 insertions(+), 37 deletions(-)

diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index 5e15325..017c307 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,17 @@
+2008-01-30  Jim Meyering  <meyering@redhat.com>
+
+	Improve "rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty"
+	* src/rmdir.c (remove_parents, main): With --ignore-fail-on-non-empty,
+	suppress a diagnostic also for e.g., EACCES, which can happen
+	with read-only media or when the parent directory has the immutable
+	attribute (set via chattr +i).
+	(errno_may_be_empty, ignorable_failure): New functions.
+	* src/remove.c (is_empty_dir): Move function to ...
+	* src/system.h (is_empty_dir): ...here, and make it inline.
+	Suggested by Josselin Mouette in <http://bugs.debian.org/363011>
+	via Bob Proulx.
+	* NEWS: Mention the improvement.
+
 2008-01-29  Paul Eggert  <eggert@cs.ucla.edu>

 	Don't modify argv in dd.
diff --git a/NEWS b/NEWS
index f474141..0d2d97d 100644
--- a/NEWS
+++ b/NEWS
@@ -1,12 +1,20 @@
 GNU coreutils NEWS                                    -*- outline -*-

-* Noteworthy changes in release 6.10 (2008-01-22) [stable]
+* Noteworthy changes in release 6.?? (2008-??-??) [stable]

 ** Bug fixes

   ls no longer segfaults on files in /proc when linked with an older version
   of libselinux.  E.g., ls -l /proc/sys would dereference a NULL pointer.

+  "rmdir --ignore-fail-on-non-empty" detects and ignores the failure
+  in more cases when a directory is empty.
+
+
+* Noteworthy changes in release 6.10 (2008-01-22) [stable]
+
+** Bug fixes
+
   Fix a non-portable use of sed in configure.ac.
   [bug introduced in coreutils-6.9.92]

diff --git a/THANKS b/THANKS
index 1e04f9b..bb536b3 100644
--- a/THANKS
+++ b/THANKS
@@ -264,6 +264,7 @@ Joost van Baal                      joostvb@xs4all.nl
 Jorge Stolfi                        stolfi@ic.unicamp.br
 Joseph S. Myers                     jsm28@cam.ac.uk
 Joshua Hudson                       joshudson@gmail.com
+Josselin Mouette                    joss@debian.org
 Juan F. Codagnone                   juam@arnet.com.ar
 Juan M. Guerrero                    st001906@hrz1.hrz.tu-darmstadt.de
 Jungshik Shin                       jshin@pantheon.yale.edu
diff --git a/src/remove.c b/src/remove.c
index de8f5ff..fe603bb 100644
--- a/src/remove.c
+++ b/src/remove.c
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 /* remove.c -- core functions for removing files and directories
-   Copyright (C) 88, 90, 91, 1994-2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
+   Copyright (C) 88, 90, 91, 1994-2008 Free Software Foundation, Inc.

    This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
    it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
@@ -726,36 +726,6 @@ AD_is_removable (Dirstack_state const *ds, char const *file)
   return ! (top->unremovable && hash_lookup (top->unremovable, file));
 }

-/* Return true if DIR is determined to be an empty directory.  */
-static bool
-is_empty_dir (int fd_cwd, char const *dir)
-{
-  DIR *dirp;
-  struct dirent const *dp;
-  int saved_errno;
-  int fd = openat (fd_cwd, dir,
-		   (O_RDONLY | O_DIRECTORY
-		    | O_NOCTTY | O_NOFOLLOW | O_NONBLOCK));
-
-  if (fd < 0)
-    return false;
-
-  dirp = fdopendir (fd);
-  if (dirp == NULL)
-    {
-      close (fd);
-      return false;
-    }
-
-  errno = 0;
-  dp = readdir_ignoring_dot_and_dotdot (dirp);
-  saved_errno = errno;
-  closedir (dirp);
-  if (dp != NULL)
-    return false;
-  return saved_errno == 0 ? true : false;
-}
-
 /* Return -1 if FILE is an unwritable non-symlink,
    0 if it is writable or some other type of file,
    a positive error number if there is some problem in determining the answer.
diff --git a/src/rmdir.c b/src/rmdir.c
index 96aa9af..bb1a0c8 100644
--- a/src/rmdir.c
+++ b/src/rmdir.c
@@ -74,13 +74,41 @@ static struct option const longopts[] =

 /* Return true if ERROR_NUMBER is one of the values associated
    with a failed rmdir due to non-empty target directory.  */
-
 static bool
 errno_rmdir_non_empty (int error_number)
 {
   return (error_number == RMDIR_ERRNO_NOT_EMPTY);
 }

+/* Return true if when rmdir fails with errno == ERROR_NUMBER
+   the directory may be empty.  */
+static bool
+errno_may_be_empty (int error_number)
+{
+  switch (error_number)
+    {
+    case EACCES:
+    case EPERM:
+    case EROFS:
+    case EEXIST:
+    case EBUSY:
+      return true;
+    default:
+      return false;
+    }
+}
+
+/* Return true if an rmdir failure with errno == error_number
+   for DIR is ignorable.  */
+static bool
+ignorable_failure (int error_number, char const *dir)
+{
+  return (ignore_fail_on_non_empty
+	  && (errno_rmdir_non_empty (error_number)
+	      || (errno_may_be_empty (error_number)
+		  && is_empty_dir (AT_FDCWD, dir))));
+}
+
 /* Remove any empty parent directories of DIR.
    If DIR contains slash characters, at least one of them
    (beginning with the rightmost) is replaced with a NUL byte.
@@ -113,8 +141,7 @@ remove_parents (char *dir)
       if (!ok)
 	{
 	  /* Stop quietly if --ignore-fail-on-non-empty. */
-	  if (ignore_fail_on_non_empty
-	      && errno_rmdir_non_empty (errno))
+	  if (ignorable_failure (errno, dir))
 	    {
 	      ok = true;
 	    }
@@ -210,8 +237,7 @@ main (int argc, char **argv)

       if (rmdir (dir) != 0)
 	{
-	  if (ignore_fail_on_non_empty
-	      && errno_rmdir_non_empty (errno))
+	  if (ignorable_failure (errno, dir))
 	    continue;

 	  /* Here, the diagnostic is less precise, since we have no idea
diff --git a/src/system.h b/src/system.h
index 54c8a8b..b0b9545 100644
--- a/src/system.h
+++ b/src/system.h
@@ -384,6 +384,36 @@ readdir_ignoring_dot_and_dotdot (DIR *dirp)
     }
 }

+/* Return true if DIR is determined to be an empty directory.  */
+static inline bool
+is_empty_dir (int fd_cwd, char const *dir)
+{
+  DIR *dirp;
+  struct dirent const *dp;
+  int saved_errno;
+  int fd = openat (fd_cwd, dir,
+		   (O_RDONLY | O_DIRECTORY
+		    | O_NOCTTY | O_NOFOLLOW | O_NONBLOCK));
+
+  if (fd < 0)
+    return false;
+
+  dirp = fdopendir (fd);
+  if (dirp == NULL)
+    {
+      close (fd);
+      return false;
+    }
+
+  errno = 0;
+  dp = readdir_ignoring_dot_and_dotdot (dirp);
+  saved_errno = errno;
+  closedir (dirp);
+  if (dp != NULL)
+    return false;
+  return saved_errno == 0 ? true : false;
+}
+
 /* Factor out some of the common --help and --version processing code.  */

 /* These enum values cannot possibly conflict with the option values
--
1.5.4.rc5.1.ge6bfe

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