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I need to copy/move a file to another directory, adding a sequence to avoid overwriting other files. Example: file name is 'filename' in original directory. Target directory already contains 'filename'. When the script moves the file it should become 'filename001' and so on for more files.

Ok, so I lied about the length. You're lucky I like writing Perl scripts ; ). This should do what you're looking for (I hope it's not homework!) [code=xml] #!/usr/bin/perl -w $olddir = shift; $newdir = shift; @files = `ls $olddir`; chomp(@files); foreach $file (@files) { $oldfile = $olddir . $file; $newfile = $newdir . $file; $i = 0; $changingfile = $newfile; while (-e $changingfile) { $i++; $changingfile = $newfile . $i; } `cp $oldfile $changingfile`; } [/code] This expects the argument directories to end with a '/'. I tested it for basic cases, and it works. I wouldn't do anything crucial with it until you've tested it more rigorously though. Example usage for those who want to know: [code=xml] > ./script.pl dir1/ dir2/[/code] This assumes you've placed the script in [i]script.pl[/i] and have [i]chmod u+x[/i]ed it. Have fun! [Modified by: thobbs on December 19, 2008 02:07 AM]