sub funpack { my ($template, $source) = @_; my %hash = map { reverse split /:/, $_, 2 } split " ", $template; local $" = ' '; @hash{keys %hash} = unpack "@{[ values %hash ]}", $source; return \%hash; } my $data = funpack 'A20:name A1:sex A3:age A8:salary A12:sign', $foo;