I am using Ubuntu 12.04 and I am here to know: is there any way to limit the life time of a file?
I mean, for example, I have created a file that has to be automatically deleted 10 minutes after I close it. Is there any way to do it?
This can be easily accomplished using inotifywait from inotify-tools package (it's not installed by default):
inotifywait -e close /path/to/file && sleep 600 && rm /path/to/file
This will set up a watch on /path/to/file and wait for it to be closed. Then after 10 minutes (600 seconds) the file will be removed.
Here's a script to make things easier:
selfdestroy.sh:
#!/bin/bash
if [ $# != 2 ]; then
echo "$0 <file> <time>"
exit 1
fi
if [ ! -f $1 ]; then
echo "File $1 not found."
exit 1
fi
if (( $2 < 1 )); then
echo "Time must be > 0."
fi
(inotifywait -e close $1
sleep $2
rm $1) 2>1 >/dev/null &
Call the script like this: selfdestroy.sh /path/to/file 600.
