use List::Util qw(max min); my %id_hash; open (DATA, ".txt"); while () { chomp; my ($order, $mtime, $size, $id, $date) = split /\t/; push @{ $id_hash{$order}{$id}{mtime} }, $mtime; push @{ $id_hash{$order}{$id}{size } }, $size; push @{ $id_hash{$order}{$id}{date } }, $date; } open (OUT, ">output.txt"); for my $order (keys %id_hash) { for my $id (keys %{ $id_hash{$order} }) { my $Low = min( @ { $id_hash{$order}{$id}{mtime} } ); print OUT "$order $Low \n"; } }