Just as in your previous question, scp perl, I'm at a loss to see how this is at all related to Perl?

Cannot write to a directory.
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I would imagine that the following command would give the following output:

% ssh username:password@remoteserver file /users/merc/tmp
/users/merc/tmp:    directory
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There are probably better places, such as IRC channels, to get handholding through Unix shell exercises. While there are many people from many backgrounds with deep knowledge in many things, it really is Perlmonks, not Sshmonks. No offense.