Problem matching a patter

[john99999]

root@server1 [/]# cat ss4
#!/usr/bin/perl
$a=`uptime`;
$a =~ /[\d*],/;
#echo "a = $a"
if ( $a < 5.2 ){
print $a;
}


root@server1 [/]# ./ss4
1:04pm up 29 days, 18:41, 1 user, load average: 0.24, 0.33, 0.29

How do I get this to display only the 0.24 and not the full output of uptime?

 

[duncdude]

#!/usr/bin/perl

$_ = '1:04pm  up 29 days, 18:41,  1 user,  load average: 0.24, 0.33, 0.29';

s/.* ([\d.]+), [\d.]+, [\d.]+$/$1/;

print $_;

Kind Regards
Duncan

 

[stevexff]

qx[uptime] =~ /(\d{1,2}\.\d{1,2})/;
print "Load average = $1\n";

 

[john99999]

What does the qx[ ] do?

 

[stevexff]

Think of it as 'quote and execute'. It has the same effect as backticks but I find it makes the intent clearer. So for example

my @files = qx[ls];

puts each line of the output from the ls command into the array @files.