Hi Reagen,

Here is simple regexp. Let me know if there is any mistake.

No need to use Second array i.e. @author.

#!/usr/bin/perl

use strict;
use warnings;

my @full_authors = ( "Smith, John", "Smith, John Ronald", "Johnson, Ja
+mes", "James, Ray Jack", "Van der Burg, Jon", 

"O'Neil, Sarah" );

foreach my $author(@full_authors)
{
    my $fullauthorname=$author;
    while ($author=~s#(, .*?[A-Z])[a-z]+\s*#$1#)
    {

    }
    $author=~s#,##g;
    print "\n$author = $fullauthorname";

}
[download]

Regards,

Gopal.R.