use strict; { local $/ = '\n'; while () { my $count = () = $_ =~ /XY[0-9]+/g; print "$count\n"; } } __DATA__ 22601571,XY12273,XY18561,XY19079,XY20765,XY18924 148986884,XY18644,XY18756,XY17986,XY19453,XY19121