Steve, This is an example of the input I would be using (may have to switch to a fixed width font): 172 mon-tar.bz2 28 tue-tar.bz2 4 wed-tar.bz2 2612 thu-tar.bz2 Would that script then change this to: :172:mon-tar.bz2 ::28:tue-tar.bz2 :::4:wed-tar.bz2 2612:thu-tar.bz2 ??? Thanks, Jason