Thanks for the very quick reply! The sqls, could hold the same variable ($test_date) multiple places because there are multiple dates in the table for various purposes. The sqls are not identical in the number of variables. Some have multiple $test_date some just one. Also the order the variables in the sqls could differ from one sql to the other, so a single set of $sth->execute($schema,$test_date) would not work.

But in this case, forget about the sqls and the database connection. The sample code I submitted does not deal with the database. I just created a quick and dirty code because I was troubleshooting why my sqls errored out. Then I found out that the actual variables in the sqls don't interpolate the variable value, so I wrote up something quickly to pinpoint the issue - with no DB connection.

So again, if I just read in a text file which have some perl variables, how can I have the text read in, take on the value of the variable that I defined in the program that reads in the text? - I guess is a better definition of the issue I am facing.