use strict;
my $str = 'Oct 8 22:00:00 dev-db crond[18340]: (root) CMD (/bin/sh /home/root/bin/system_check &)
Oct 8 23:00:00 dev-db crond[20348]: (oracle) CMD (/bin/sh /home/oracle/bin/cleanup.sh &)
Oct 8 23:59:00 dev-db crond[20399]: (john) CMD (/bin/sh /home/john/bin/backup.sh &)';
my $regex = qr/^3[Aa-Zz]/mp;
my $subst = '\\1 -> \\3';
my $result = $str =~ s/$regex/$subst/rg;
print "The result of the substitution is' $result\n";
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for Perl, please visit: http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html