Proper Way To Use Grep?

[StormMedic85]

Within an array of files, I'd like to search for files with a specific pattern. All the files follow a standard format (for example, abc123.YEAR.MONTH.DAY.abc.TIME). I'm trying to use grep but I think my implementation may be incorrect. Here's an example of how I'm trying to do things. Perhaps it'll be easy to see where I'm going wrong. Thanks!

$dirname = "/directory";
opendir(FH, $dirname);
while (defined($file = readdir(FH))) {
@filearray = "$dirname/$file";
}

@filematch = grep(/abc123.$year$month$day.abc.$time/, @filearray);

print "The matched files are @filematch";

 

[ishnid]

What's contained in the $year, $month, $day and $time variables?

 

[StormMedic85]

The year, month, day, and time...as inputted by the user.

 

[brigmar]

Two culprits:

1:

while (defined($file = readdir(FH))) {
    [b]@filearray = "$dirname/$file";[/b]
}

You need to be adding to the array...

while (defined($file = readdir(FH))) {
    [b]push @filearray, "$dirname/$file";[/b]
}

2: Your regex should have the periods escaped

/abc123\.$year$month$day\.abc\.$time/

 

[brigmar]

BTW, you probably don't even need grep() for this level of matching.
glob() should be enough.

print join "\n", glob( "$dirname/abc123.$year$month$day.abc.$time" );

 

[ishnid]

If the user is supplying the exact date and time, then there isn't any pattern to match, as far as I can see. If you have the date and time, you also have the full filename, no?