--- a/scripts/miscellaneous/module.mk	Mon Nov 07 15:00:55 2011 -0500
+++ b/scripts/miscellaneous/module.mk	Mon Nov 07 15:46:06 2011 -0500
@@ -51,6 +51,7 @@
   miscellaneous/parseparams.m \
   miscellaneous/perl.m \
   miscellaneous/python.m \
+  miscellaneous/recycle.m \
   miscellaneous/rmappdata.m \
   miscellaneous/run.m \
   miscellaneous/semicolon.m \

--- /dev/null	Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 1970 +0000
+++ b/scripts/miscellaneous/recycle.m	Mon Nov 07 15:46:06 2011 -0500
@@ -0,0 +1,66 @@
+## Copyright (C) 2011 John W. Eaton
+##
+## This file is part of Octave.
+##
+## Octave is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
+## under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
+## the Free Software Foundation; either version 3 of the License, or (at
+## your option) any later version.
+##
+## Octave is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but
+## WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
+## MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU
+## General Public License for more details.
+##
+## You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
+## along with Octave; see the file COPYING.  If not, see
+## <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
+
+## -*- texinfo -*-
+## @deftypefn  {Function File} {@var{current_state}} recycle ()
+## @deftypefnx  {Function File} {@var{old_state}} recycle (@var{new_state})
+## Display or set the preference for recycling deleted files.
+##
+## Recycling files instead of permanently deleting them is currently not
+## implemented in Octave.  To help avoid accidental data loss it
+## is an error to attempt enable file recycling.
+## @seealso{delete}
+## @end deftypefn
+
+## Author: jwe
+
+function retval = recycle (state)
+
+  persistent current_state = "off";
+
+  if (nargin > 1)
+    print_usage ();
+  endif
+
+  if (nargin == 0 || nargout > 0)
+    retval = current_state;
+  endif
+
+  if (nargin == 1)
+    if (ischar (state))
+      if (strcmpi (state, "on"))
+        error ("recycle: recycling files is not implemented");
+      elseif (strcmpi (state, "off"))
+        current_state = "off";
+      else
+        error ("recycle: invalid value of STATE = `%s'", state);
+      endif
+    else
+      erroor ("recycle: expecting STATE to be a character string");
+    endif
+  endif
+
+endfunction
+
+%!error recycle ("on");
+%!error recycle ("on", "and I mean it");
+%!error recycle (1);
+
+%!test
+%! recycle ("off");
+%! assert (recycle ("off"), "off");