open my $some_filehandle, "<", "quotefile.txt"; my $set_size = 3; my $set = random_set_of_n($some_filehandle, $set_size); sub random_set_of_n { my ($fh, $size) = @_; my @set; local ($., $_); seek $fh, 0, 0; while (<$fh>) { chomp; push @set, $_; last if @set == $size; } # XXX: @set *should* be shuffled now if you care about ordering while (<$fh>) { chomp; $set[rand @set] = $_ if $size/$. > rand; } return \@set; }