a single huge line of 1000s of words

Slurp the file and use index, rindex and substr:

my $content = do{ local @ARGV = 'theFile.htm'; <> };
my $first = index $content, 'Oct-18-2013';
my $last = rindex $content, 'Oct-18-2013';

print substr $content, $first, $last;;
[download]

Thanks a lot i am almost done now. Just wanted to ask is there any way to search a file for a string bottom up? I know there is a module file::readbackwards,But i am not able to install it. any other way?

Secondly how do i search ABCXXX where xxx could be Jan Feb...... Dec

Thanks

Ankur

is there any way to search a file for a string bottom up?

There are ways, but unless your file(s) are so big that you cannot fit them in memory(?), I wouldn't bother because they are horribly inefficient.

Secondly how do i search ABCXXX where xxx could be Jan Feb...... Dec

Use regex.

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Tip Use a regex!