#! /usr/local/bin/perl -w use strict; my @x = ( 4, 4, 2 ); my @y; my $i = -1; #56 chars with whitespace removed. @y = map {sprintf("XX%02d:%d",!$_?++$i:$i,$_)} map {0..$_} @x; foreach (@y) { print ">$_\n"; }