Array slices on the fly
#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;
my $line = "named:x:44:66:Nameserver Daemon:/var/named:/bin/bash";
my @fields = split ":", $line; # fetch 3 values like this
my $uid = $fields[2];
my $gid = $fields[3];
my $home = $fields[5];
($uid, $gid, $home) = @fields[2,3,5];
($uid, $gid, $home) = (split ":", $line)[2,3,5]; # or like this
print "uid: $uid\n";
print "gid: $gid\n";
print "home: $home\n";