foreach my $file (@files) { my @output = (); print "\n Processing with file $file \n"; open my $fh, '<', $file or die $!; my $count = 0; while (<$fh>){ ++$count; # match any keyword if (/($re)/){ my $kw = $1; push @output, [$kw,$file,$count,$_]; } } close $fh; # sort by record timestamp @output = sort { $a->[3] cmp $b->[3]} @output; #pp \@output; # output my $outfile = 'output_'.$file; print "Check the output generated In file $outfile\n"; open my $fh_out, '>', $outfile or die "$!"; for (@output){ my $kw = $_->[0]; if ( defined $kwhashref->{$kw} ){ print $fh_out "\n*******$kwhashref->{$kw}*******\n"; } printf $fh_out '%s in file %s, line %d:%s'.$/, @$_; } close $fh_out; }