#! perl use strict; use warnings; my $dir = 'foo'; my $ls = (grep { /\s+$dir$/ } `ls -il`)[0]; $ls =~ /^\s*(\d+)/; my $inode = $1; print "$dir --> $inode "; rename $dir, 'bar'; $ls = (grep { /^\s*$inode\s+/ } `ls -il`)[0]; $ls =~ /:\d{2}\s+(.*)$/; print "--> $1\n";