Here is what I wrote so far:

#! /usr/bin/perl -w
# match.pl

system("clear");
print "Please enter a file to be searched: ";
$file_searched = <STDIN>; chomp $file_searched;

open (FILE1, $file_searched) || die "File not found.\n";
@line = <FILE1>;
close FILE1;

print "What text pattern do you want to search for? ";
$pattern = <STDIN>; chomp $pattern;

$line_number = 1;
foreach $line (@line) {
if($line =~ m/$pattern/g) {
print "Found another \"$pattern\" at Line Number: $line_number.\n";
}
$line_number++;
}

exit 0;

END OF CODE

What can i do to add to this that will accept an option like this:
./match.pl filename search_string

????

Well, you need to use the @ARGV array.

Alex

probably want Getopts in there too if it gets more complex.

How would I implement that into a Perl script since it doesnt have an int main(int argc, char *argv[])?

It's just an already-existing global variable.

Alex

ok, ok... now really...
what would this code look like? :-)

@ARGV is just an array of the arguments passed to the program (which I can't be bothered to write for you just now; someone else might). There's a lot of freely available documentation on these kinds of Perl basics, not least the comprehensive man page documentation that comes with Perl.

Alex

sounds a lot like an RTFM to me, JStew!

yeah, it is acid-- i really tried to disguise it as best i could but, you know ignorance... hard to conceal it at times :-)

yeah, that and old age are a bad combination i guess.....

<grumble> well, thanks a lot acid ... you killed the thread! </grumble>