my $olddate = '20020131'; MyBenchmark::benchmark( $ARGV[0],[ ['regexp \d{}' => sub { my $new; $olddate =~ m/^(\d{4})(\d{2})(\d{2})$/ and $new = "$1-$2-$3"; $new }], ['regexp ..' => sub { my $new; my @p = $olddate =~ /^(....)(..)(..)$/; $new = join '-',@p; $new }], ['s/// \d{}' => sub { my $new = $olddate; $new =~ s/^(\d{4})(\d{2})(\d{2})$/$1-$2-$3/; $new }], ['substr' => sub { my $new = $olddate; substr (((substr ($new,4,0) = '-'),$new),7,0)='-'; $new }], ['join unpack' => sub { my $new; $new = join '-', unpack 'a4 a2 a2', $olddate; $new }], ['sprintf unpack' => sub { my $new; $new = sprintf '%s-%s-%s', unpack 'a4 a2 a2', $olddate; $new }], ], '2002-01-31' #expected output );