#!/usr/bin/perl use strict; use warnings; my @data = ; print "data\n"; print @data; my @sorted = # do a little transform map { join(' ', @$_) } # join sort { &by_date($a, $b) } # sort map { [ split / /, $_ ] } # split grep { s/^A\d+ // } # clean @data; print "sorted\n"; print @sorted; sub by_date { my($a_mon,$a_day,$a_year) = split m[/], $a->[1]; my($b_mon,$b_day,$b_year) = split m[/], $b->[1]; return ($a_year <=> $b_year or $a_mon <=> $b_mon or $a_day <=> $b_day); } __DATA__ A19234 hostname 06/08/07 moredata moredata A19284 hostname 07/09/07 moredata moredata A19384 hostname 06/06/06 moredata moredata A19234 hostname 07/08/07 moredata moredata A19284 hostname 07/09/07 moredata moredata A19384 hostname 06/09/07 moredata moredata A19234 hostname 07/06/06 moredata moredata A19284 hostname 07/09/07 moredata moredata A19384 hostname 06/09/07 moredata moredata