Actually, I'm not even tokenizing it. Each line is a separate equation, and the worst line is a couple hundred characters. Perl-only regex sledgehammers work fine. ;-D

Normally, I'd be jumping into CPAN as you suggest. I'm learning one thing here in this multipolyglot hodgepodge of systems, though. This particular project is not needed on many architectures, but many are, and keeping a module tree up to date is not a trivial thing here. For example, a co-worker has just spent literally two weeks full time and more just building gcc up to 3.4 on SPARCs running various Solarii variants. Much as I love CPAN and use it frequently, if I can do it native, I do.

Besides, I learn more that way. ;-D