my @ary = ; my $find_id = 1006; my ($code, $string ); for my $line( @ary ) { next unless $line =~ m/^$find_id/; chomp $line; ( $code, $string ) = split ',', $line; last; } if ( $string ) { print "Found '$string'\n"; } else { print "No match!\n"; } __DATA__ 1001,choochoo 1002,candycane 1003,sockpuppet 1004,choochoo 1005,candycane 1006,sockpuppet6 1007,foo 1008,bar