my $folder = "/usr28/users/mpcamp/ZDOCK"; chdir $folder or die "chdir $folder failed: $!"; # method 1: use a glob: @files = grep /^com\d+$/, ; # OR method 2: use opendir/readdir: opendir( D, "." ); @files = grep /^com\d+$/, readdir( D ); closedir D;