sibyurik:

To illustrate what the Anonymous Monk above posted, here's a pair of functions, one of which is using a global (funky), and the other a local (monkey):

use strict;
use warnings;

my $str1='';

sub funky {
    my $count = shift;
    return if $count > 5;
    $str1 = 4*$count;
    my $indent = "funky" . " "x$count;
    print $indent,"before recurse: count=$count, str1=$str1\n";
    funky($count+1);
    print $indent,"after recurse:  count=$count, str1=$str1\n";
}

sub monkey {
    my $count = shift;
    return if $count > 5;
    my $str = 4*$count;
    my $indent = "monkey" . " "x$count;
    print $indent,"before recurse: count=$count, str=$str\n";
    monkey($count+1);
    print $indent,"after recurse:  count=$count, str=$str\n";
}

funky(0);
monkey(0);
[download]

As you can see in the results below, the global variable $str1 got whacked, so has the same value after recursion for each level. The local value, however, retains its value, so can continue. The same thing is happening with your directory handle from readdir: When you recurse, you've clobbered the value, so you can't continue from that point. In fact, when the lowest level if your function is done, the directory handle is reporting "Nope, no more files" for each level on return.

$ perl recurse.pl
funkybefore recurse: count=0, str1=0
funky before recurse: count=1, str1=4
funky  before recurse: count=2, str1=8
funky   before recurse: count=3, str1=12
funky    before recurse: count=4, str1=16
funky     before recurse: count=5, str1=20
funky     after recurse:  count=5, str1=20
funky    after recurse:  count=4, str1=20
funky   after recurse:  count=3, str1=20
funky  after recurse:  count=2, str1=20
funky after recurse:  count=1, str1=20
funkyafter recurse:  count=0, str1=20
monkeybefore recurse: count=0, str=0
monkey before recurse: count=1, str=4
monkey  before recurse: count=2, str=8
monkey   before recurse: count=3, str=12
monkey    before recurse: count=4, str=16
monkey     before recurse: count=5, str=20
monkey     after recurse:  count=5, str=20
monkey    after recurse:  count=4, str=16
monkey   after recurse:  count=3, str=12
monkey  after recurse:  count=2, str=8
monkey after recurse:  count=1, str=4
monkeyafter recurse:  count=0, str=0
[download]

Update: Immediately after posting, I realize that I didn't need two functions to illustrate it, the count variable is already localized, so the first function was enough. Ah, well.

...roboticus

When your only tool is a hammer, all problems look like your thumb.