Here's an option:

use strict;
use warnings;

my $directory = '.';

for my $YMLfile (<"$directory/*.yml">) {
    open my $fh, '<', $YMLfile or die $!;

    while (<$fh>) {

        # process the file's contents
    }

    close $fh;
}

[download]

Update: Perhaps I've misunderstood your issue. In one place you say that you want the files "...to be opened so the timestamp may be read...," as if the timestamp may be a string within the file. Yet, at the beginning, you mention a script that can "...check the age of over 20,000 YML files..." In the latter case files are not opened. If it's the latter case, the following may assist you:

use strict;
use warnings;
use File::stat;

my $directory = '.';
my $currentTime = time;

for my $YMLfile (<"$directory/*.yml">) {
    my $mtime = stat($YMLfile)->mtime;

    print "$YMLfile: " . ( $currentTime - $mtime ) . " seconds old\n";

}

[download]

You can also try the -M operator on the files, which returns the file's age in days:

for my $YMLfile (<"$directory/*.yml">) {
    print -M $YMLfile, "\n";
}

[download]

And the following PM node may be helpful: How do I find and delete files based on age?.

I strongly suggest running your file-deleting script on a practice directory.

In reply to Re^3: Reading every file in a directory by Kenosis
in thread Reading every file in a directory by spookyjack123

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