Try Text::Autformat and split to get the first line. 
use strict;
use warnings;

use Text::Autoformat;

my $string = 'A lengthy text with more than xxx characters to demonstr
+ate truncate';


print "Before: $string\n";
print 'Length: ' , length($string) , "\n";

my $truncated  = &truncate($string,20);


print "After: $truncated\n";
print 'Length: ' , length($truncated) , "\n";

###########################################################
sub truncate {
    my $string = shift @_;
    my $length = 75; 
    $length = shift if @_;
    

    $string = autoformat($string, {     left  => 0,
                                      right => $length ,
                                      widow => 0,
                                 });
        ($string) = split(/\n/,$string); # Just the first element
        
        return $string;
} ##
###########################################################

[download]
Just my two cents. Hope this helps

In reply to Re^3: How do I truncate a string while preserving words? by tomfahle
in thread How do I truncate a string while preserving words? by Cap'n Steve

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