note ThingFish More clarification here.. I do actually use a variable as an indice, as thelenm pointed out. The column to be sorted on is passed via query string and is plugged into the sort. Ex: <code> @file_data = map { $_->[0] } sort { $a->[$variable] cmp $b->[$variable] } map { [ $_, (split(/\|/)) ] } @file_data; </CODE> 175743 175743