SHORT STORY ALL FIXED THANKS
Sorry for horrible formatting but Perl Monks makes posting a pain (all
+ those tages I cant remember hidden in the site so finding how to pos
+t takes 10 minutes I'll never get back each time).  

Thanks for taking a look.  Here is what I've found.  The file that con
+tains the matches has loads of drives like this
\\HOFIL01\CALDWELLS$ 
\\GEMINI1\CAMBRIDGE$ 
\\GEMINI1\ADMIN 
\\GEMINI2\CONFERENCE 
\\HOFIL02\PROJECT 
\\HOIFL02\CURRFUNC 
\\HOFIL01\CAPELLAC$ 
\\HOFIL01\CARKEEKF$ 

When the script hits a line like \\HOFIL02\PROJECT it breaks.  If I ch
+ange it to \\HOFAL02\PROJECT or \\HOFIL02\PROJECT THIS or \\HOFIL02\P
+Z (but no lower letter than Z) it will work (or stop on the next \\ho
+fil02\p(a-y) (but if it ended in $ it was ok?!

in horror at the oddness of this I simply removed all \,$ and spaces f
+rom the variables before comparing them which worked fine.  How bizza
+r?  What would cause only lines starting in \\hofil02\p(a-z)$ to caus
+e an issue?  Also for a start I just removed any space from the varia
+bles.  Then it would stop on half the lines starting in \\hofil02\p(a
+-z)???$ (eg \\hofil01\pathis$).

The Dat file that these patterns where being matched against looked li
+ke this.

[NATIONAL OFFICE]
floor=2
h:=\\moent14\username$
i:=\\aknt1\operations

The dats had no space on the end of the drive entries but the matching
+ file did.  All very odd.  My Perl was always bad and now it is rust 
+so here is my current full script (no laughing please it works nicely
+).  I'll mod it up to output the changed files (and eventually to rep
+lace the existing ones after some more testing).

#  Once more into the Perl Dear Friends     Bruce Taylor :: Datacom Co
+nsulting
#
#  Search all MOE DAT files in a given directory, remove any lines fou
+nd in another given file



use File::Find;            # Built in perl function that finds files i
+n directories (find - traverse a file tree)
                # http://www.perldoc.com/perl5.6.1/lib/File/Find.html

$feeddir     = @ARGV[0];    # @ARGV is the built in perl array that is
+ feed to the script from the command line
$feeddir    =~ s/\\/\//;    # If the dir is given using \ (like c:\tem
+p) then subsitute all \ for /'s

if ($feeddir =~ "") 

{
system("cls");
print "\n\n\n\nNo directory specified\n\n";
print "You need to specify a driectory to search down\n"; 
print "EG... SearchReplace.pl c:\\TEMP\DATS\n\n\n\n\n";
die; 
}


chdir("$feeddir");            # Change working directory to the now co
+rrected directory given on the command line
find(\&wanted, "$feeddir");        # use the built in find command wit
+h the wanted subroutine and send it the $feeddir variable

sub wanted                 # the wanted subrouting is used to select o
+nly .dat files(further) down and set the filename
{                        # the { is used to start a code block
        /\.DAT$/i or return;            # Nab only DATS or go to the n
+ext file
    $filename = $File::Find::name;        # set $filename variable to 
+full path\name ie c:\temp\dats\datfile.dat
    &Details($filename);            # so we have the file and then fee
+d that into the Details sub/sub routine
}

sub Details {                    # the Details sub

$file = shift;    

# Open the file containing the matches to remove
open(BADSHARES, "c:/testy/Bad_Shares.txt");
@BadShares = <BADSHARES>;
close BADSHARES;

# Open the file/s to remove these matches from
open(CURRENTDAT, "$file");
@DatLines = <CURRENTDAT>;    
close CURRENTDAT;

# For each line of the file containing the matches to remove
for ($a = 0; $a < scalar(@DatLines); $a++)
{
    # Go through each line of the file you want to remove the matches 
+from
    for ($i = 0; $i < scalar(@BadShares); $i++)
    {
    # Remove any \, $ or space from the line being worked on from each
+ file (seems to upset perl in unnatural ways)
    
    $BadShares[$i] =~ s/ //g;
    $BadShares[$i] =~ s/\\//g;
    $BadShares[$i] =~ s/\$//g;
    $DatLines[$a] =~ s/ //g;
    $DatLines[$a] =~ s/\\//g;
    $DatLines[$a] =~ s/\$//g;


    next if (!($DatLines[$a] =~ m/($BadShares[$i])/i));

            chomp $DatLines[$a];
            chomp $BadShares[$i];

            print "$file  $DatLines[$a]    $a    $BadShares[$i]       
+ $i\n";
            }
    }

}
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