Can any1 help me : if i want to know the no. of file in a paricular directory, how to find it. I want to use that o/p in loop, so o/p should be in digits. Eg. 81 so that this 81 i can use in loop. if i use $ dir/total . i am getting o/p as: Total of 81 files. but i need only 81 so that loop can run 81 times.

The command $ pipe directory/total | - (read sys$pipe line ; read sys$pipe line ; - read sys$pipe line ; read sys$pipe line ; - n=f$element(2," ",line) ; define/job NF &n) puts the number into the job logical nf. Then nf=f$trnlnm("NF") puts the number into the symbol NF. This procedure depends on the output format of the directory command. Depending on the purpose of Your question, a more secure would be a loop like this nf.com: $ if p1.eqs."" then p1="*.*;*" $ n=0 $ stream=0 $ loop: $ f=f$search(p1,stream) $ if f.eqs."" then goto end $ n = n + 1 $ goto loop $ end: $ write sys$output "Number of files: ",n $ nf == n !return number in global symbol nf Joseph Huber, http://www.huber-joseph.de ITRC