#!/usr/bin/perl -w use strict; sub human { my (@r, $g, $s, $l); while (@_) { $l = $g = $s = shift; $l = shift while (++$g eq ($_[0] || '')); push(@r, $s eq $l ? $s : "$s-$l"); } @r; } print join(", ", human(1..12, 14..21, 'aa'..'af', 'zz'..'aaf')), "\n"; print join(", ", human(1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 14)), "\n";