my $word = 'bantha fodder';

my @letters = split//, lc($word);

my %counts;

for(@letters){
    $counts{$_}++;
}

for(sort {$counts{$b} <=> $counts{$a}} keys %counts){
    my $t = $_ =~ /[a-z]/ ? 'letter' : 
            $_ =~ /[0-9]/ ? 'number' : 'character';
    my $s = $counts{$_} > 1 ? 's' : '';
    printf " the  %-10s: %-3s ocurred %-3s time%s\n",
           $t,$_,$counts{$_},$s
}