Talk about confusing me! Try this one on your system: echo 15 | awk '{t1=-15;t2=15;t3=-t2;t4=-$1;print t1,t3,t4}' On my system (Unisoft V.0) it produces: -2.71875 -2.71875 -2.71875 The expression "t1=0-15" works correctly. -- Geoff Kuenning {hplabs,ihnp4}!trwrb!desint!geoff