Strings don't increment this way, if what you are trying to do is take 
$alias = "johnq.smith1";
$alias++;

[download]
and turn $alias into 
"johnq.smith2"

[download]
. What you'll need to do is save the digits into a temporary variable, increment them, then append to the digitless string: 
$alias = "johnq.smith1";

if ($alias =~ s/(\d+$)//) {
  $alias .= $1++;
  # $alias is now "johnq.smith2"
}

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There are, of course, other ways to achieve this, but not via directly incrementing a string.

Update: Ignore my response. Of course you can increment strings this way. Is it friday yet?

In reply to Re: incrementing strings by moot
in thread incrementing strings by deathbygoats

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