while (@filename) { my $i; $file=shift @filename; use Cwd 'chdir'; chdir "./data"; open (FILE, "$file") or die; while () { next while $i++ <= 14; (my $id, undef, undef, my $signal, undef, undef)=split(/\t/); push @{$outputdata{$id}}, $signal; } close (FILE); }