#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

#open(IN, "data1.tab") || die $!;
# while(<IN>) {
#     print "line is $_";
#     my @line = split(/\s+/,$_);
#     print "the array is @line\n";
#     print "range is ", $line[2] - $line[3], "\n";
# }

my $string = 'a big dog sat on the porch';
my @list = split(/\s+/,$string);
print "list is ", join(',', @list), "\n";
my @list2 = split(/a/,$string);
print "list is ", join(',', @list2), "\n";
print "string is ", join('a', @list2), "\n";