use strict; use warnings; my $str = 'aabcdabcabcecdecd'; my $min_length = 1; my $min_count = 2; my %count; count( $str ); while (my ($string, $counts) = each %count) { if ($counts >= $min_count) { print "$string => $counts\n" if length($string) >= $min_length; } } exit; sub count { my( $string) = @_; my $length = length( $string ); return if $length < $min_length; for my $l ($min_length..$length) { my $substring = substr( $string, 0, $l ); $count{$substring} += 1; } count( substr( $string, 1 ) ); }