[root@devel3 root]# time ./trinum_c.pl >out_c real 0m1.158s user 0m1.150s sys 0m0.000s [root@devel3 root]# cat trinum_c.pl #!/usr/bin/perl use Inline 'C'; my $file = $ARGV[0] || 'targets.txt'; open (INPUT, '<', $file) or die "Unable to open $file for reading : $!"; while ( ) { chomp; get_three( $_ ); } __END__ __C__ #include int p_tri( int num ) { double x; int t; x = ( sqrt( 8 * (double)num + 1 ) + 1 )/ 2; t = (int)x; return (double)t == x ? 0 : t; } int get_three ( int num ) { register prev,i,j,tri; if ( ! (prev = p_tri( num )) ) { printf( "%d, 0, 0\n", num ); return 1; } while ( --prev ) { for( tri=prev*(prev+1)/2,i=0,j=num-tri; j>=i; j--,i++ ) { if ( 0==p_tri(i) && 0==p_tri(j) ) { printf( "%d, %d, %d\n", tri, i, j ); return 1; } } } printf( "Something went horribly wrong : %d\n", num ); return 0; } [root@devel3 root]#