$/ = "\n";
my $count;
open (FH, "myfile.text") || die "Cannot open file: $!";
$count++ foreach (<FH>);
close FH;
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Update #1 - Also see the post from djw in this thread here.

Update #2 - A piece of code designed to illustrate foreach really should use foreach and not while - Thanks Hofmator++

Update #3 - And the snippets from Masem and davorg in this thread here and here are illustrative - Thanks especially to davorg for the $. suggestion.

perl -e 's&&rob@cowsnet.com.au&&&split/[@.]/&&s&.com.&_&&&print'

Of course you don't actually need to keep a count, as Perl does that for you in $..

--
<http://www.dave.org.uk>

"The first rule of Perl club is you don't talk about Perl club."

Or, probably faster, and with the benefit of having the file read into memory:

my ( $count, @data );
open (FH, "myfile.txt") or die $!;
$count = scalar (@data = <FH>);
close FH;
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-----------------------------------------------------
Dr. Michael K. Neylon - mneylon-pm@masemware.com || "You've left the lens cap of your mind on again, Pinky" - The Brain
"I can see my house from here!"
It's not what you know, but knowing how to find it if you don't know that's important

I doubt it's efficient but this just looks too wierd not to mention.

my $lines = do{
        my $file_name = 'in.txt';
        open my $fh, $file_name or die "$file_name: $!";
        () = <$fh>;    };

print $lines;
[download]




HTH,
Charles K. Clarkson

Oh, and sorry to annoy you further, Rob, how does $. work? I could use the excuse that I'm living on the same side of the globe as you are...

$. will always contain the current record number from the most recently read file handle.

Full documentation for all of Perl's special variables can be found in perlvar.

--
<http://www.dave.org.uk>

"The first rule of Perl club is you don't talk about Perl club."

see perldoc perlvar or here.

-- Hofmator