while () { my @Data = split ( /\s+/ ); print "Compare $Data[2] and $Data[5].\n"; } __DATA__ 50545 4.393864E+00 .0 50546 9.589456E+00 .0 50547 2.690474E+00 .0 50548 -1.668896E+01 .0 50549 -3.391918E+01 .0 50550 -3.634581E+01 .0 50551 -3.176630E+01 .0 50552 -1.747830E+01 .0 50553 -5.256684E-01 .0 50554 1.135265E+01 .0