It is weird. The frustrating part is that the reason I can't do:

foreach my $file(@list_of_files_to_compare_to_start_date_file){
if ($file_a != $file) {
print "$file\n";
  }
}
[download]

is that I need to build in logic for brain-dead people that are responsible for certain naming-conventions contained in these files. Because of this, the above could incorrectly report a not-equalling b, based upon my definition of "equals"