PHP recursive file& folder delete function: 'Directory not empty' error message

Question

I'm trying to create function which removes all file and directories on webhosting excluding given files and folders arrays

function cleanUp($exdirs, $exfiles){
$it = new RecursiveIteratorIterator(
  new RecursiveDirectoryIterator('.'), 
  RecursiveIteratorIterator::CHILD_FIRST
);
foreach($it as $entry) {
  if ($entry->isDir() && !in_array($entry->getBasename(), $exdirs)) {
    rmdir($entry->getPathname());
  }
  else {
    if (!in_array($entry->getFileName(), $exfiles)) {
      unlink($entry->getPathname());
    }
    else {
      $exdirs[] = dirname($entry->getFileName());
    }
  }
}
}

And calling this function like this

$excludeDirsNames = array('cgi-bin');
$excludeFileNames = array('.htaccess', 'ws.zip', 'update.php');
cleanUp($excludeDirsNames , $excludeFileNames);

Now the problem is, it deletes but getting error message: Directory not empty on line rmdir($entry->getPathname()); several times. How to fix that problem?

Answer 1

You allow to exclude files and directories, but you don't test, if a directory contains other files, or directories, that were excluded before.

if (substr($oneExcludedFileOrDirectory, 0, strlen($currentDir) === $currentDir) {
  echo "Directory not empty";
}

Just a simple prefix comparison: Is "dir" is prefix of one of the excluded paths? Only works for absolute paths (and some other minor things), but it should explain, whats the matter.

Answer 2

Here are two reasons why it not work:

1) In one of your child-folder are files you are excluding. There are not deleted, so it is not possible to "rm" the folder.

2) After the "unlink" and "rmdir"-Funktion call "clearstatcache();". I think this will solve your problem. The files are delete, but the information is still available in the cache.