sub stats { my %hhp = @_; my $keyCounter = {}; # a counter hash of which keys are used at level two my $statCounter = {}; # a counter for the actual values foreach my $key1 (keys %hhp) { my @cList = (); foreach my $key2 (sort keys %{$hhp{$key1}}) { push(@cList,$key2); my $statKey = sprintf("%s->%s=%s",$key1,$key2,$hhp{$key1}{$key2}); ++ $$statCounter{$statKey}; # make statistical entry on value } ++ $$keyCounter{join('+',@cList)}; # make statistical entry on key2 } return ($keyCounter,$statCounter); } #### main my ($keyResult,$statResult) = stats(%hash); foreach my $hash ($keyResult,$statResult){ foreach my $key (sort keys %$hash){ print "$key $$hash{$key}\n"; } } __END__ ## the result x 1 x+y+z 1 x+z 1 y+z 1 a->x=40 1 a->z=102 1 b->x=10 1 b->y=20 1 b->z=100 1 c->x=50 1 d->y=30 1 d->z=101 1