Using $: to change break line character

Hi all,

I am trying to chunk my files into strings.
It's normally done by:

open (FILE,'<filename');
while (<FILE> )
{
}

But this time I don't want to break line like that. My record may be on more than 1 line. At the end of each record I have a special string '~~REC~~' I want to break my file by this '~~REC~~' string. I read the Perl book, it mentions about the variable $:
But I try to change it $:='~~REC~~', it doesn't work. The book says the default value is $:=' n-'

Any suggestion please!

Thank you very much for your help.
Nam.

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana,Arial,Helvetica">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by NamHN:
My record may be on more than 1 line. At the end of each record I have a special string '~~REC~~' I want to break my file by this '~~REC~~' string.[/quote]

If I understand correctly, you want to break this file into individual records. If so, what you want to do is set the 'Input Record Separator', or $/ to '~~REC~~':

$/ = '~~REC~~';

open FILE, "<$file" or die "cannot open file $file: $!n";

while (defined($rec = <FILE> )) {
.
.
.

Now $rec should hold the contents of a record. Hope this helps...