in reply to Comparing files

Lots of gaps to fill in, but this is the basic idea.
my $first_file = pop @all4; my $master_list = get_all_mac_addresses_from_file($first_file); foreach my $filename (@all4) { my $this_list = get_all_mac_addresses_from_file($filename); foreach my $address (keys %$master_list) { if ( ! exists $this_list->{$address} ) { delete $master_list->{$address} } } } # now $master_list is a hashref whose keys are the # mac addresses in all the files, so output them # however you want. sub get_all_mac_addresses_from_file { my ($file_name) = @_; # i dont know what format your files are # you need to write something to get the names # out of the files, and return them as the keys # of a hashref # The values dont matter. ... return \%the_list; }