use strict; use warnings; my @a = qw(0 6:4 12:8 19:31); my $s = ''; vec($s,0,32) = 0; for (@a){ if (/(\d+):(\d+)/){ vec($s,$_,1) = 1 for(($1<$2) ? $1..$2 : $2..$1); } else { vec($s,$_,1) = 1; } } my @bits = split(//,unpack("b*",$s)); my $series = 0; for(0..31){ if ($bits[$_] eq 0) { if (!$series) { print; $series = $_; } } else { if ($series) { print ( ($series+1 < $_) ? ':'.($_-1).' ' : ' '); } $series = 0; } }