How about this?

Only thing is when I include:

use warnings;
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I get the following errors:

Use of uninitialized value in string eq at ./delete_list_ver2.pl line 
+27.
Use of uninitialized value in print at ./delete_list_ver2.pl line 37.
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    # open files, read into array, sort array
    open (ORGLIST, "<", $ARGV[0]);
    open (DELLIST, "<", $ARGV[1]);
    my @orgList = <ORGLIST>;
    my @delList = <DELLIST>;
    close ORGLIST;
    close DELLIST;
    @orgList = sort(@orgList);
    @delList = sort(@delList);
    
    # counter for entries removed
    my $j = 0;
    # iterate through @delList
    foreach my $line (@delList){
        # iterate through @orgList
        for ( my $i = 0 ; $i < @orgList ; $i++ ){
            # if found delete from array 
            if ($line eq $orgList[$i]){
                $j++;
                delete $orgList[$i];
                
            } # end if
        } # end for
     } # end foreach   
    
    print "Entries Removed: $j \n";
    open ( NEWORGLIST, ">", "test.out");
    print NEWORGLIST @orgList;
    close (NEWORGLIST);
    
    unlink @orgList; unlink @delList;
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You cannot use length to get the number of array elements, see length and scalar (the latter you should use instead).

The last line is also strange. Do you really want to unlink the arrays?

Well, this is getting better, but still doesn't really match the algorithm. You have eliminated a lot of unnecessary reads, but you still have an O(n*m) solution, which can be improved on greatly. To get around this (and make the code much cleaner), you need to implement the hashing step I outlined in the above node.

Here's just a small snippet to get you thinking. This does the setup of the %del hash.

# Step 2
my %del;
open my $dellist, '<', $delfile or die "Could not open $delfile: $!\n"
+;
for (<$dellist>) { chomp; $del{$_} = 1; }
close $dellist; # Step 3
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Now the 'key' bit (if you'll pardon the pun) is that you never, ever have to iterate through that list again, or open the del file again.

Step 4 is where you iterate through your org list. The setup will be similar to the del list, except that for each line in your org list, you just need to check whether it exists in your %del hash and act accordingly. For instance, exists $del{1234} returns true if and only if `1234' is a key in your %del hash. Read the exists page for more detail.

From your code it looks like you have influence from other structured programming languages. (Are you perhaps thinking that unlink is something like C's free(3) to free allocated memory? You don't need to do that in Perl; it handles garbage collection for you automatically.)

That influence from other languages will certainly help you, but Perl has rich features that you'll want to take advantage of. For instance, the introduction on hashes could be sort of life changing if you're coming from a language that doesn't have a built-in hash/associative array data type.

From your code it looks like you have influence from other structured programming languages. (Are you perhaps thinking that unlink is something like C's free(3) to free allocated memory? You don't need to do that in Perl; it handles garbage collection for you automatically.)

Haha, that's what they said about java... and, well--we all know the truth...

I started with BASIC when I was a wee tot. I only ever learned enough to copy out of the BASIC book. From there I took a VBasic course and learned VB6. From that I was able to apply what I'd learned into automating MANY tasks with VBA. Parallel to that I was trying to learn C++; I've never even gotten a "Hello World" program to work in C++. After that I focused my energy on C# which I grasped rather quickly and banged out several "practice" programs. Also IMPORTANT to note this is when I discovered the "open source" world, and discovered how to shed my Microsucks dependencies...

Enter Ubuntu...

At this point I've changed schools and majors (I'm a certified EMT... But I needed a way to pay for my paramedic degree...). Enter Computer Science.

Computer Science:

Fortunately as a previous Math major I've completed most of the requirements for my CS degree. As a CS Major, our language of study is java... IMHO on of the most klutzyist languages I've studied.

In parallel to starting my CS Major I landed a job. This job promoted me programming where I learned to love Perl.

Anyway... Long Story Short (too late), Out of necessity I've needed to become a Server and Perl Expert over night. Obviously, I still have some learning to do.

I'm really not sure how making a hash key = 1 is helpful. I understand making "the whole mess" a key is like making it an array.

I've been studying from "PERL By Examply" By Ellie Quigly. Can you maybe recommend a better book?

So how about this?

#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;
use diagnostics;

if (@ARGV = 2){
my %delList;
my @orgList;
open (BEEPON, >>, "/path/to/beepon.file);
open (BEEPOFF, >>, /path/to/beepoff.file);
open (DELLIST, <, $ARGV[0]);
foreach (<DELLIST>){
   %delList{chomp($_)} = 1;
}
close DELLIST;

open (ORGLIST, <, $ARGV[1]);
   @orgList = <ORGLIST>
close (ORGLIST);

for (my $i = 0; $i < @orgList; $i++){
     if (exists $del{$orgList[$i]}){
         print BEEPON $orgList[$i];
     }
     else
         print BEEPOFF $orgList[$i];
     }
}
close BEEPON;
close BEEPOFF;
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I can see how this would be more efficient. I'm not really sure that it is what you outlined... I'm still not entirely understanding the use of hashes. ie why are all the values set to 1?