Ok thik I am getting this a little more. I printed it using Dumper like so: 
print Dumper(\%entries),"\n";
which produces

     'kloesch' => {
                         '291' => {
                                    'gecos' => '',
                                    'host' => '/home/dbsmith/passwd.sp
+sdbp.hpux',
                                    'gid' => '102'
                                  }
                       },
          'sapdp4' => {
                        '484' => {
                                   'gecos' => '',
                                   'host' => '/home/dbsmith/passwd.dud
+bdv02.aix',
                                   'gid' => '208'
                                 }
                      },

[download]
I have been banging my head at how to get at gecos and gid and uid in the right printed format. The output I would like it is: 

wlprdadm => uid #s, gid and gecos found on
        /home/dbsmith/passwd.eipdbmp1.hpux
        /home/dbsmith/passwd.carappp1.hpux

but of course being uid, gid and gecos actual values.

Finally, can a hash only contain keys like so: 

my %hash;
my array= (a..d);
$hash{$_}++ foreach @array;

[download]
thank you

In reply to Re^6: trying to decide best data structure for problem at hand. by mikejones
in thread trying to decide best data structure for problem at hand. by mikejones

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