under windows-ntfs if you special characters in a filename… you can get into trouble deleting them (from command prompt it should always work)

under linux-ext3 you can run into similar problems if a filename (for whatever reason) contains “–” (two minuses)

to remove them go:

# under linux it is possible to have some very special file names like:
# create file with special chars in filename
touch -- ?[?1049lVim:
rm -rf "?[?1049lVim:"; # will not work
rm -rf '?[?1049lVim:'; # will not work
# works
rm -- ?[?1049lVim:
rm: remove regular empty file ‘\033[?1049lVim:’? y

# create file with special chars in filename
touch -- --testings.html
# another example
rm -- --testings.html

The — option tells rm to treat all further arguments as file names, not as options, even if they start with -.

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