Thank you all so much. I will make these changes. I am just getting back into perl after a few years off, and was only new even then, so some of your questions and suggestions are a little over my head, but I have books and a thirst for knowledge, so I'll keep working on it. The ironic part is the old pprogram still works. I just added an ini file read upstream of this logic. I'll will undoubtedly be back. Thanks again, so glad the monastery is here.