use File::Spec::Functions qw(canonpath splitdir);

my (@path) = splitdir canonpath $path;
# @path now contains ('', 'home', 'a', 'ff.pl')

print $path[2], "\n";

##</code><code>##

my ($userhome) = ($path =~ m!^/home/([^/]+)!);

##</code><code>##

my @path = split m!/!, $path;
# @path is now ('', 'home', 'a', 'ff.pl')

print $path[2], "\n";