$query = "bush and clinton and bush and obama and huckabee"; @searchTexts = split (/and|or/i,$query); for ($i = 0; $i <= @searchTexts +1 -1; $i++) { @searchTexts[$i] =~ s/^\s+//; @searchTexts[$i] =~ s/\s+$//; print @searchTexts[$i]."\n"; }