Is there any considerable speed advantage to using the string instead of the array? Or does it have to do with memory usage?

Using strings instead of arrays will definitely use less memory as each scalar has a certain amount of overhead so two strings vs. two arrays of strings will use less.   Another way to reduce memory usage is to use a piped open and read each line in a while loop.

As for speed, it depends on how much IO overhead is involved from reading the output of an external program.   But in general using strings should be faster than using arrays.   As always, if in doubt use Benchmark or one of the profilers to determine the speed differences.

This may also provide some help: When perl is not quite fast enough

---

---

Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!

Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.

Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.

Please read these before you post! —

• How do I compose an effective node title?
• How do I post a question effectively?
• Markup in the Monastery

Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:

a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr

You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)

	For:		Use:
	&		&
	<		&lt;
	>		&gt;
	[		&#91;
	]		&#93;

Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?

See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.