How can I undelete a file or directory?

[Aaron Howell]

With the standard ext2 and ext3 filesystems, there is no mechanism for recovering deleted files.
There are a couple of utilities that can assist you to recover part or all of your files, however they require a fairly advanced knowledge of the filesystem layout.
There are also "trashcan" utilities which act like the recycle bin under windows, where files are moved to a trash directory rather than deleted, 
however this won't help you for already deleted files.
The premise with any sort of Unix (and Linux is no exception) is that once its gone, its not coming back.
In any case, if you're going to try to recover deleted files, the important thing is to unmount the effected partition immediately.
the chances of you getting them back (especially directories) if you've moved or copied files around is next to zero.
If you want to give it a go, there's a howto at
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO/mini/ext2fs-Undeletion
(if you don't understand the contents of that, undeleting files under Linux is not for you.)
Regards
Aaron
On Fri, Jun 14, 2002 at 11:23:42AM +0300, Octavian Rasnita wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> If I've deleted a file using rm file command, what should I do to recover
> that file back?
> Thank you.
> 
> PS. Is there any command for recovering a deleted directory?
> 
> Teddy,
> orasnita at home.ro
> 
> 
> 
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> Speakup at braille.uwo.ca
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