$text is the ininitialized variable. It isn't set to anything, ever. Warnings and strict would have been helpful to you. I think you want: s/^go/\//g and $count++ while(<FILE>);The way you coded that, $count is the number of substitutions, not the number of lines in the file.

I also think you want to chomp the filename you get from STDIN.

After Compline,
Zaxo