use Data::Dump; my @argv = qw/ foo --job X --job Y --job Z /; my ($args, $job) = split /--job /, join( ' ', @argv ); dd $args, $job; __END__ ("foo ", "X ") #### use Data::Dump; my @argv = ('--hello','world --job foo','--job','bar'); my ($args, $job) = split /--job /, join( ' ', @argv ); dd $args, $job; __END__ ("--hello world ", "foo ")