#!/usr/bin/perl -w use strict; my $ID = 1; while () { # this regex captures the trailing number if # the line starts with a ">" # the .*? means a "minimal match" of anything while # allowing the rest of the regex to succeed. # the \n is counted as white space, a \s* character # if (my ($number) = $_ =~ /^>.*?(\d+)\s*$/) { print '>ID'.$ID++," $number\n"; } else { print; } } =prints >ID1 80 AGGGGGGGGGTTCCC >ID2 85 TTTCCCGGGAAAA >ID3 112 GGCCCCTTTGAGG =cut __DATA__ >Sample_1_x80 AGGGGGGGGGTTCCC >Sample_2_x85 TTTCCCGGGAAAA >sample_3_x112 GGCCCCTTTGAGG #### while () { if (my ($sample, $number) = $_ =~ /^>.*?(\d+).*?(\d+)\s*$/) { print '>ID'.$sample," $number\n"; } else { print; } }