t-rex, you will have to try a bit harder with your posts. With 47 posts, you've been around long enough that by now you should have at least mastered some of the syntax and terminology.

I have the following string: A1=<m,n>:<p,q>:<s,t>...go on

• Is all of that stuff in code brackets the "string"?

• Or, is the A1= part meant to indicate that the rest is assigned to a variable called "A1"?

  If so, where are the quotes ('' or "") around the "string"?

  Where is the sigil($) on the variable name?

• Is the "..,go on" also part of the string?

  Or is that meant to indicate that the :<n,m> bit can be repeated more times?

  If so, don't you mean "so on"?

  And wouldn't it be clearer if you put that bit outside of the code brackets!?

I have to extract values m,n,p,q,s,t from the above array.

• Why has the "string" suddenly become an "array"?
• Are m,n, etc. just single alphabetical characters? Or perhaps single digit numbers? Or multi-digit numbers?

How do i do it

After 6 months here you haven't achieved any enlightenment as to where to start?