delete files from network share

I was using grunt quite happely when I stumbled upon an issue in removing files from a network location with grunt-contrib-clean

So I just tried del in combination with gulp but ended having (at first glance) the same issue. I’m new to gulp so maybe i’m missing something. This is my extremely simple gulpfile.js

var gulp = require('gulp'),
    del = require('del');

gulp.task('clean', function(cb) {
    del(['//some/network/location/*'], { force: true }, cb)
});

gulp.task('default', function() {
    gulp.start('clean');
});

Running gulp gives me no errors but the files in //some/network/location are still there. Is this unsupported use, misuse or a bug?

I’m running gulp on a Windows 8 machine from within Git bash. Shared location is on my synology NAS.

[landed1]

I am here too …issues on shared drive requires the force option…here is my code

gulp.task('clean',function(){
  return gulp.src(DEST)
      .pipe(vinylPaths(del(DEST, { force: true })));
});

I was using vinylPaths as I wanted to do this on a stream of ONLY changed files

[schnittstabil]

ATM, glob does not support UNC globs, see https://github.com/isaacs/node-glob/issues/74 and https://github.com/isaacs/node-glob/pull/146. Thus, this also applies to del.

However there’s a workaround:

1. use glob’s root option: The place where patterns starting with / will be mounted onto.
2. use a glob pattern starting with /.
3. use del’s force option: Allow deleting the current working directory and outside.

Example:

del('/dist/css/*.css', {
  root: '//ComputerName/SharedFolder',
  force: true,
});

Notes:

1. globbing ComputerNames is not possible – Windows processes these in a different way

2. globbing SharedFolders is not possible – Windows processes these in a different way

3. Promises fail silently, i. e. to output error message one need to catch it:

   del(…).then(console.log).catch(console.error)
   

4. Of course, gulp outputs errors, but only if one return the Promise:

   gulp.task('clean', function() {
     return del(…);
   });
   

This should answer all questions.