in reply to reading in fixed width

For Fixed witdths, you are probably better off using substr or unpack , rather than regex.

    ..."I don't know what the facts are but somebody's certainly going to sit down with him and find out what he knows that they may not know, and make sure he knows what they know that he may not know, and that's a good thing. I think it's a very constructive exchange," --Donald Rumsfeld