use CGI; 
use strict; 
  
my $q = CGI->new; 
my $DB = "/path/to/file.db"; 
my $pattern = $q->param('pat'); 
my ($pos, @matches, $last_loc, $more); 
  
open FILE, $DB or die "can't read $DB: $!"; 
  
# jump ahead in file to continue searching 
seek FILE, $pos, 0 if $pos = $q->param('pos'); 
  
while (<FILE>) { 
  chomp(my @fields = split /\|/); 
  # assume a match if the description matches 
  if ($fields[1] =~ /$pattern/o) { 
    push(@matches, \@fields); 
    $last_loc = tell(FILE) - length;  # get position 
    last if @matches == 11;  # yes, 11 
  } 
} 
close FILE; 
  
# figure out if there's more 
$more = @matches == 11 and pop @matches; 
  
display(@matches); 
more_button($last_loc,$pattern) if $more; 
  
sub display { ... } 
  
sub more_button { 
  my ($pos,$pat) = @_; 
  print qq{See <a href="prog.cgi?pos=$pos&pat=$pat">more</a>.\n}; 
}