Im a little confused. As posted your code goes into an infinte loop. When I s/$file/\$string/g I get the output as you said we would (impressive) However if minlen is 0 it goes into an infinite loop!

Also when I try the string:'hellohiothellobrakerakerashash' I only get one of the many words contained, and a couple that arent words.

  2 : (hello)
  2 : (aker)
  2 : (ash)
[download]

hello,hi,othello,brake,rake,raker,rash,ash,hash,ohio,
the,lob,bra,hell,era

# I get this using substr counts:
ak,ake,aker,akera,as,ash,el,ell,ello,er,era,
he,hel,hell,hello,ke,ker,kera,ll,llo,lo,
ra,rak,rake,raker,rakera,sh
[download]

--
You are not ready to use symrefs unless you already know why they are bad. -- tadmc (CLPM)