FTP how to delete empty folders (only)

I need delete (automatically, recursively) lot of empty directories on server (there are non-empty dirs too). I have FTP access only (no SSH etc.).

Exist some client, which can do this? Preferably for Windows, but Linux may be too.

1 Answer

You could use FileZila (You can download it from )

Log in using your FTP credential and url . You should have the folder structure in the UI of FileZila.

Alternatively From Command Line :- Where yourdomain.com is your domain or the FTP Server IP Address found in the HELM Control Panel under the FTP Account Details.

c:\>ftp yourdomain.com

Once you hit Enter it will attempt to connect to the server. If it is successful, you will be prompted for a Username and Password. Enter the FTP username and password information to login.

mdelete folder_name/*
rmdir folder_name

This Should do the job

If you can log on to the server try below

Try this for Windows :-You can use this utility: Remove Empty Directories

Alternatively you can use this one-liner batch file:

for /f "delims=" %%d in ('dir /s /b /ad ^| sort /r') do rd "%%d"

One-liner taken from DownloadSquad, an excellent site to add to your RSS feeds. :)

Try this command for Linux:

find . -empty -type d -delete

The find command is used to search for files/directories matching a particular search criteria from the specified path, in this case the current directory (hence the .).

The -empty option holds true for any file and directory that is empty.

The -type d option holds true for the file type specified; in this case d stands for the file type directory.

The -delete option is the action to perform, and holds true for all files found in the search.

I got it to work in two steps, on a server with restricted access, no SFTP, only FTP through commandline.

Like this :

mdelete folder_name/*
rmdir folder_name