sure-rm

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sure-rm is a command-line tool written in Rust. It works just like the system rm.

Instead of permanently deleting files from disk, it moves them into a recoverable trash store. Files are only permanently deleted when you explicitly ask for it.

Install

brew tap ChunzhengLab/tap
brew install sure-rm

See homebrew-tap for details.

Modes

--mode and the SURE_RM_MODE environment variable support three modes:

• auto: detect based on TTY
• interactive: prompt once for riskier operations
• batch: no extra prompts, execute directly

The recommended setup is interactive mode with a shell alias:

alias rm='sure-rm --mode interactive'

Or set the default mode via environment variable:

export SURE_RM_MODE=interactive
alias rm='sure-rm'

This makes rm behave as sure-rm. When you need a real delete, use rm -s ... (or rm --sure ...) to fall back to the system command.

Note: Shell aliases only apply in interactive terminals. In scripts, rm remains /bin/rm and existing automation is unaffected.

Features

Safely delete files, symlinks, and directories — moved to trash by default instead of permanent deletion.

Subcommands

• list — view all entries in the trash
• restore — restore an entry by id or by original path
• purge — permanently clean the trash, by id, by path, or --all
• unlink — single-file delete entry point: sure-rm unlink [--] <path>

Options

• Supports nearly all rm options: -d, -f, -i, -I, -p, -r/-R, -v, -x
• -p permanently delete, skip the trash
• -s / --sure bypass sure-rm, exec system /bin/rm or /bin/unlink
• --mode auto|interactive|batch control prompt behavior, also configurable via SURE_RM_MODE

Safety

• Automatically blocks dangerous targets like /, ., .., current directory, and HOME

Examples

# Set up alias
alias rm='sure-rm --mode interactive'

rm -rv build                           # move build/ to trash, verbose output
rm -sf build                           # bypass sure-rm, exec /bin/rm -f build
rm list                                # list all entries in the trash
rm restore 1774864212-68302-250054000  # restore a specific entry by id
rm restore ./notes.txt                 # restore by relative path
rm restore ../docs/notes.txt           # cross-directory relative path works too
rm restore /home/user/notes.txt        # restore by absolute path
rm -pv old.log                         # permanently delete, skip the trash
rm unlink -- -file                     # unlink a file named "-file"

Trash

The trash is located at ~/.sure-rm by default.

rm list                                # view trash contents
rm restore ./notes.txt                 # restore a file
rm purge 1774864212-68302-250054000    # permanently delete one entry by id
rm purge ./notes.txt                   # permanently delete one entry by path
rm purge --all                         # empty the trash

You can override the trash path via environment variable for testing or sandboxed execution:

SURE_RM_ROOT=/tmp/sure-rm sure-rm -rv some-directory

Auto-expiry (TTL)

Set SURE_RM_TTL to automatically purge entries older than the specified duration. Expired entries are cleaned up when running list.

export SURE_RM_TTL=30d   # 30 days (default unit is days)
export SURE_RM_TTL=12h   # 12 hours
export SURE_RM_TTL=3600s # 3600 seconds

Set to 0 or leave unset to disable auto-expiry.

Inspiration

Inspired by jwanLab, who spent months building an awesome project, then deleted it in less than a second.