/ ((?:src\s|dst\s|translated\s)?\S+) \n? = (")? ((?:(?(2)[^"]|\S)(?!\S+=))+) /xmg; #### use warnings; use strict; use Data::Dumper; my %hash; my @records; my $record; { local $/ = "\n\n"; @records = ; } for (@records) { ++$record; $hash{$record}{$1} = $3 while $_ =~ /(\S+)=(")?((?:(?(2)[^"]|\S)(?!\S+=))+)/mg; } print Data::Dumper->Dump([\%hash]); __DATA__ messages:Dec 17 09:41:08 10.14.93.7 ns5xp: NetScreen device_id=ns5xp system-notification-00257(traffic): start_time="2002-12-17 09:45:58" duration=5 policy_id=0 service=tcp/port:8000 proto =6 src zone=Trust dst zone=Untrust action=Permit sent=1034 rcvd=19829 src=10.14.94.221 dst=10.14.90.217 src_port=1059 dst_port=8000 translated ip=10.14.93.7 port=1223 messages:Dec 17 09:41:08 10.14.93.7 ns5xp: NetScreen device_id=ns5xp system-notification-00257(traffic): start_time="2002-12-17 09:45:59" duration=4 policy_id=0 service=tcp/port:8000 proto =6 src zone=Trust dst zone=Untrust action=Permit sent=722 rcvd=520 src=10.14.94.221 dst=10.14.90.217 src_port=1060 dst_port=8000 translated ip=10.14.93.7 port=1224