Hi,
first of all I want to say that I could fairly easy replace my second snippet with the opendir/readdir thing. Great!

-MO=Deparse is a very useful thing. Thanks for that.
I was trying to adapt it for my needs but it didn't work as it should.
It simply processes the first record (accessibility) and than hangs.

sub scan {

  $lb1->insert('end', "Scanning...");

  my $counter = '0';
  my $file = '/usr/ports/y.lis';
  my $outf = '/usr/ports/yyy.lis';
  open(ARGV,$file) or die $!;
  open(OUTF,">$outf") or die $!;

  BEGIN { $/ = "\n"; $\ = "\n"; }
  LINE: while (defined($_ = <ARGV>)) {
   chomp $_;
    use File::Glob ();
    foreach $_ (glob("$_/*")) {

   if (!/Makefile(.inc|)$/) {
   printf OUTF "$_\n"; }

   else {
    $counter++;
    }
}
   close(ARGV);
   close(OUTF);
   print "processed $counter records.";
   $lb1->insert('end', "Done.");
}
}
[download]

The content of the /usr/ports/y.lis file is as following:

accessibility
arabic
archivers
astro
audio
...and about 70 more.
[download]

The content of the /usr/ports/yyy.lis file (produced by the code above) is as following:

accessibility/accerciser
accessibility/at-poke
accessibility/at-spi
accessibility/at-spi-reference
accessibility/atk
accessibility/atk-reference
accessibility/dasher
accessibility/eflite
accessibility/gail
accessibility/gail-reference
accessibility/gir-repository-atk
accessibility/gnome-mag
accessibility/gnome-speech
accessibility/gnopernicus
accessibility/gok
accessibility/java-access-bridge
accessibility/kdeaccessibility
accessibility/kdeaccessibility4
accessibility/linux-atk
accessibility/linux-f10-atk
accessibility/linux-f8-atk
accessibility/mousetweaks
accessibility/orca
accessibility/py-papi
accessibility/qt4-accessible
accessibility/ruby-atk
accessibility/speech-dispatcher
accessibility/yasr
[download]

Anybody has an idea why it hangs?

Besides I need $lb1->insert('end', "Scanning..."); to take effect before the processing starts, instead the Scanning... and Done. line appear at the same time after all is done, at least in my second code which works, but needs two sub-routines:

sub scan {

  $lb1->insert('end', "Scanning...");

  my $counter = '0';
  my $file = '/usr/ports/y.lis';
  my $outf = '/usr/ports/yy.lis';
  open(ARGV,$file) or die $!;
  open(OUTF,">$outf") or die $!;

  BEGIN { $/ = "\n"; $\ = "\n"; }
  LINE: while (defined($_ = <ARGV>)) {
    chomp $_;
    use File::Glob ();
    foreach $_ (glob("$_/*")) {
    printf OUTF "$_\n";
    $counter++;
    }
}
   close(ARGV);
   close(OUTF);
   print "processed $counter records.";

   $lb1->insert('end', "Done.");

   clean();
}

sub clean {
 
   $portscount = '0';
   $ifile = '/usr/ports/yy.lis';
   $ofile = '/usr/ports/yyy.lis';
   open(IFILE, $ifile) or die $!;
   open(OFILE,">$ofile") or die $!;
   while (<IFILE>) {
   $_ =~ s/\s+//g;

   if (!/Makefile(.inc|)$/) {
   printf OFILE "$_\n"; }
   else {

   $portscount++; }
}
   close(IFILE);
   close(OFILE);
   print "processed $portscount records.";

}
[download]

I've tried to merge (not only append!) these two sub-routines all night long without success.

Kind regards,
unknown-monk

P.S.: I wonder if it's too "noobish" to simply live with this two sub-routines.