use strict; use warnings; my %data = ( 1 => 'A', 2 => 'B', 3 => 'C', 6 => 'D', 9 => 'E', 10 => 'F', ); my $max_key = 0; for ( keys %data ) { $max_key = $_ if $_ > $max_key; } for ( 1 .. $max_key ) { $data{$_} = '-' unless $data{$_}; } print "$_ : $data{$_}\n" for keys %data; #Outputs 6 : D 3 : C 7 : - 9 : E 2 : B 8 : - 1 : A 4 : - 10 : F 5 : -