You could handle number overflow like Excel does: 

sub format_num { 
   my $s = sprintf('%5.2f', $_[0]);
   return length($s) > 5 ? 'XXXXX' : $s;
}

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In reply to Re^4: Format, empty vars, and fixed-width records by ikegami
in thread Format, empty vars, and fixed-width records by kwaping

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