Question

Every time I run this code I get the error File or directory doesn’t exist. Why?

read -p "Enter the filename/path of the file you wish to delete : " filename
echo "Do you want to delete this file"
echo "Y/N"
read ans
case "$ans" in 
   Y) "`readlink -f $filename`" >>~/TAM/store & mv $filename ~/TAM/dustbin
        echo "File moved" ;;
   N) "File Not deleted" ;;
esac

When I enter the file name/directory exactly and triple check its right I still get this error, but the readlink part works.

Answer 1

Paraphrasing/summarizing/extending my answer for a similar question:

• I doubt you really meant to use & instead of && in your script.

• "File Not deleted" is not a valid command on any Linux system that I have used. Perhaps you are missing an echo there?

• You have to fix your variable quotation. If the filename variable contains whitespace, then $filename is expanded by the shell into more than one arguments. You need to enclose it into double quotes:

  mv "$filename" ~/TAM/dustbin
  

• I do not see your script creating the ~/TAM/ directory anywhere…