Hi folks. I need to select a single file name from a list of filenames and assign it to a variable.
I currently do this in a few shell scripts using: $last_file=`ls -1r somedata_file.dat.*.orig | head -1` The "*" represents a timestamp in the filename. This allows me to select the most recent file, in this case. as an example, this would return a value such as : somedata_file.dat.20011203130101.orig which would be stored in $last_file When I do this in Perl thusly: $oldfile = `system "ls -1r $oldfile.\*.orig | head -1"`; Where $oldfile contains the first part of a filename passed in via Getopt::Long . $oldfile is empty. I think it contains the return value from the call to the system, so I am not properly assigning the output value, (the single filename), to it. I verify that $oldfile does contain a value with a print statement immediately prior to the statement with 'system' in it. Am I somehow stepping on $oldfile by using it to re-assign a new value to itself? Am I screwing up on the various tic's? How can I do this? Should I use File::Find? If so, how? I have not been able to find how to do this with File::Find in any of the O'Reilly books or on the web. Thanks, Tom Wright -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
