#!/usr/bin/perl use strict; use warnings; my $count = 0; while (my $line = ) { chomp $line; my @fields = split ";" , $line; my $rows = $fields[2]; $count++; } print "$count\n"; __DATA__ 13645722;20110327203202.0Z;20140211204731.0Z 14947374;20110327203202.0Z;20140220135320.0Z 15962660;20110327203156.0Z;20131106113716.0Z 17480884;20110327212821.0Z;20131211143804.0Z 13054554;20110327203141.0Z;20131205162959.0Z