supported as well by ksh and bash on all UNIXes I've seen so far (about a dozen variants). And, by beginning the first line of a script with "#!/bin/sh" (without the quotes, of course), the use of sh is forced. Helge -- H.Blischke at srz-berlin.de H.Blischke at srz-berlin.com H.Blischke at acm.org