$line="Bart  Lisa Maggie Marge Homer";
@simpsons=split(/\s/, $line); #splits $line and uses a piece of whitespace as a delimiter.

#@simpsons now contains ("Bart","","Lisa","Maggie","Marge","Homer");
#notice there is an extra space between Bart and Lisa so we get an empty element in the array there.
#lets try a better delimiter that will eliminate that from happening

@simpsons=split(/\s+/ $line); #now splits $line on 1 or more whitespace characters
#@simpsons now containts ("Bart","Lisa","Maggie","Marge","Homer");