\_ SMTP quoth Trent Shipley on 3/26/2003 13:33 as having spake thusly: \_ \_ [very well explained answer] \_ \_ my $first_datum = m/$first_separator \_ [^:] \_ $middle_separator \_ /x; \_ my $middle_datum = m/$middle_separator \_ [^:] \_ $middle_separator \_ /x; \_ my $last_datum = m/$middle_separator \_ [^:] \_ \Z \_ /x; The only gotcha is that this assumes that there are but three fields. David