Mark Bixby and other experienced perl programmers on the list could have done this in a flash, but it took me a couple of hours to figure it out. In case someone might benefit from this, here's how I did it: ---<code begin>--- # to replace the non printable characters in a file...(with spaces) $filename = "/AIH/TEMPDATA/PMFEXT"; $fileout = "/AIH/TEMPDATA/PMFEXT2"; open(OUT, ">$fileout"); open(IN, "<$filename"); $_ = <IN>; #read the first line s/[^[:print:]]/ /g; print OUT "$_"; while(<IN>) { #loop as long as not EOF s/[^[:print:]]/ /g; print OUT "$_"; } ---<code end>--- * To join/leave the list, search archives, change list settings, * * etc., please visit http://raven.utc.edu/archives/hp3000-l.html *