Slowly remove file files in a directory

slow-rm.sh

#!/bin/bash
#
# Slowly remove files from a directory
# Usage: slow-rm.sh [-dry-run] dir
#
# Removes files older than MIN_AGE_DAYS one at a time syncing and 
# sleeping after every BATCH_SIZE files.
# A BATCH_SIZE of 300 will take at least 56 minutes to remove 1M files

BATCH_SIZE=300
MIN_AGE_DAYS=3

if [ $1 == '-dry-run' ] ; then
  RM_CMD="echo rm"
  shift
else
  RM_CMD="rm"
fi

cd $1
echo "Removing files from $PWD with $RM_CMD"

count=0
find . -type f -mtime +$MIN_AGE_DAYS |
while read path
do
  $RM_CMD $path
  let "count += 1"
  if [[ $(( count % $BATCH_SIZE )) -eq 0 ]] ; then
    echo -n '.'
    sync
    sleep 1
  fi
done
echo