Thanks for your input. I haven't been using Perl for very long, so I am sure that there are several other ways to do what I did. My first objective was just to see if I could solve a problem. Although using a CPAN module may have been easier and already tested, it doesn't really give me the opportunity to solve the problem on my own. I never really thought too much about the clear screen lines, but I will keep that in mind for any future code I post. I'll be sure to start using strict. As you mentioned, it's just good practice. I am correct in my statement about what is required after using split, however, I should have used better terminology in my comment, and not described it as a bug. I'm not familiar with the 3-arg form of open, so that is something I will look into. Good point on the STDIN and STDOUT. I will keep this in mind for any future code. Thanks again for the feedback, It will definitely give me some things to research and think about for any additional code I write. -B