#!/usr/bin/perl use strict; use warnings; my @array=(); open (INF, "$file"); my $state= 0; while (){ if ($state==0) { if (/^First line of text$/) { $state=1; } next; } if ($state==1) { if (/^second line of text$/) { $state=2; } elsif (/^First line of text$/) { $state=1; } else { $state=0; } next; } if ($state==2) { if (/^in the third line I have (\d*\.\d*)/) { push(@array,$1); $state=0; } elsif (/^First line of text$/) { $state=1; } else { $state=0; } next; } }