Here is the script I created taking a string from the log (though hard coded).

I am glad you enjoyed it. Perl coding is fun. I do have a couple of suggestions

suggestion 1: use strict and warnings. These will alert you to dangerous coding practices. They are a great way to learn to write solid code.

#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;
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:-)

OK here is a version of your code tidied up a bit, compiling under strict and not throwing warnings

#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;

# switch one in for testing each case. 
#
# my $statement = "File extraction sucessfully completed in 8s 180ms";
my $statement = "File extraction sucessfully completed in 3min 8s";
# my $statement = "File extraction sucessfully completed in too much t
+ime";

my @values = split(/\s+/, $statement); # split on any number/sort of w
+hitespace

my @time;
$time[0] = pop @values;
$time[1] = pop @values;

# or use and array slice
# my @time = @values[-2,-1];

my $seconds = 0;
for my $val (@time) {
   if    ($val =~ s/min$//) {
      $seconds = $seconds + $val * 60;
   }
   elsif ($val =~ s/ms$//) {
      $seconds = $seconds + $val / 1000;
   }
   elsif ($val =~ s/s$//) {
      $seconds = $seconds + $val;
   }
   else {
      print "Warning, strange value in expected time field: $val\n";
      exit;
   }
}
print "Total time taken: $seconds seconds \n"
[download]

Cheers,
R.

Pereant, qui ante nos nostra dixerunt!

Thanks !