my $cChipId; my $cSubVersId; my %data_ids; my $readline; if(open (my $CFILE,"config.txt" ) || die "couldnt open file:", $! ) { while ($readline = <$CFILE>) { chomp $readline; my ($key , $value) = (split /::/, $readline); $data_ids($key) = $value; $readline = <$CFILE>; } foreach my $key (keys %data_ids) { $cChipid = $data_ids('chipid'); $cSubVersId = $data_ids('subversid'); } } close($CFILE);