# ... use IPC::Open2 'open2'; my( $chaos, $sorted ); my $pid= open2( $sorted, $chaos, 'sort' ); while( <> ) { my $ascii= encode( 'cp1047', $_ ); print $chaos substr($ascii,3,17), substr($ascii,20,2), $_; } close $chaos; while( <$sorted> ) { print substr( $_, 19 ); }