using PERL over C does indeed have its benefits. PERL takes advantage of encapsulation offering many modules allowing you to perform various tasks with relative simplicity. Since it is a report language, it takes advantage of awk like expressions. PERL offers a faster development cycle as the need for compiling and linking is omited. PERL is a conveniance language, it will permit you to write powerful programs in short time frames, it is less picky than C and will be your friend.