All post scriplets, but if you just need to read the first 10 lines from the command line, there are shorter ways to achive that goal

$ head -10 file
$ perl -ne'1..10 and print' file
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The advantage of the perl way is that you can also easily get stuff from the middle, say printl only line 12345:

$ perl -ne'12345..12345 and print' file
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while (<>) {
  print if (1 .. 10);
}
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#!/usr/bin/perl -wT
use strict;
for(1..10) {
  print scalar(<>);
}
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#!/bin/perl -w

# readable and extendable

while (<>) {
    if (1..10) { print $_;}
    else {last;}
}
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#!usr/bin/perl
use strict;
open FILE, "<$ARGV[0]"; # $ARGV[0] is the file name  
                      # to pass in in the command line.
my $i=1;
while (<FILE>) {
  if ($i >10) { last;}
  print $_ ;
  $i++;
}
close FILE;
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do { ($counter++ < 11) ? print : last } while (<F>)

while (<>) {
  $. > 10 ? last : print;
}
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Not recommended! Slurps the entire file into memory...

Yes, I know.

Memory is plenty and cheap :) and my fingers are clumsy and lazy :D

CountZero

A program should be light and agile, its subroutines connected like a string of pearls. The spirit and intent of the program should be retained throughout. There should be neither too little or too much, neither needless loops nor useless variables, neither lack of structure nor overwhelming rigidity." - The Tao of Programming, 4.1 - Geoffrey James

or alternatively:

open my $tenlines, "|head myfile.txt";

print $tenlines;
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