#!/usr/bin/env perl use strict; use warnings; my (@data, @max); while () { push @data => [ split /,/ ]; @max = map { my $len = length $data[$#data][$_]; ( $max[$_] ||= 0 ) >= $len ? $max[$_] : $len; } 0 .. $#{$data[$#data]} - 1; } my $template = 'A' . join(A => ( map { $_ + 1 } @max ), '*'); print pack $template => @$_ for @data; __DATA__ Account,Login Name,Password,Web Site,Comments,Extra Google Docs,george123,F0oB@r,http://www.google.com/docs,The GoodleDocs site,A Amazon,george123,fo0bA7,http://www.amazon.com,The Amazone Kindle site,B Apple,george123,mM_B39Aa,https://www. ... shorter,My Apple account,C Longer Account,Login Name,Password,Web Site,Comments,D Account,Longer Login Name,Password,Web Site,Comments,E Account,Login Name,Longer Password,Web Site,Comments,F Account,Login Name,Password,Longer Web Site,Comments,G Account,Login Name,Password,Web Site,Longer Comments,H XAccount,XLogin Name,XPassword,XWeb Site,XComments,I