Well, initially I was thinking that since the actual folder names are ######.##a_files (think html folders) that I would find the first part of the name and save it in $1

Now that I look at it again with your replies, I see that it'd be a lot easier if I just negated "_files" and did /(^_files)/

That was silly of me to not escape the dot :( And I'll have to read a bit more on the lookahead find because ?: still does not make perfect sense to me... Thanks!