use strict; use warnings; use Data::Dump; my @window; push @window, scalar for 1..5; # init while (my $line = ) { push @window, $line; chomp @window; if( $window[3] =~ m/[^\d]+\d+/ ){ dd \@window; } shift @window; } __END__ alpha beta something a07607 b-alpha b-beta b-something b-something else c-alpha c-beta c-somethin a9706 d-alpha d-beta d-something d-something else