diff --git a/include/ucore/string.h b/include/ucore/string.h
index ccdb53d..a8f22be 100644
--- a/include/ucore/string.h
+++ b/include/ucore/string.h
@@ -96,7 +96,8 @@ char* uc_sprintbs(char *result, unsigned short value);
 
 /** Like http://swtch.com/plan9port/man/man3/getfields.html
  */
-int getfields(char *str, char **args, int max, int mflag, const char *set);
+int getfields(char *str, char **args, int max, int mflag, const char *sep);
+int gettokens(char *str, char **args, int max, const char *sep);
 
 //Converts bytes to a human representable test, (i.e. 12kB, 160 MB 1.78 GB etc.)
 ///result should be at least of size 12,
diff --git a/src/gettokens.c b/src/gettokens.c
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7c6c9a4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/gettokens.c
@@ -0,0 +1,58 @@
+#include <string.h>
+#include "ucore/string.h"
+
+//tokenize string, and exclude the quotes
+static char *qtoken(char *s, const char *sep)
+{
+    int inquote = 0;
+    char *t = s;
+    while (*t != 0 && (inquote || strchr(sep, *t) == NULL)) {
+        if (*t != '"') {
+            *s++ = *t++;
+            continue;
+        }
+
+        if (!inquote) {
+            inquote = 1;
+            t++;
+            continue;
+        }
+
+        if (t[1] != '"') {
+            t++;
+            inquote = 0;
+            continue;
+        }
+        //double quotes, merged to 1 quote 
+        t++;
+        *s++ = *t++;
+    }
+
+    if (*s != 0) {
+        *s = 0;
+        if (t == s) {
+            t++;
+        }
+    }
+   
+   return t; 
+}
+
+int gettokens(char *str, char **args, int maxargs, const char *sep)
+{
+    int nargs;
+
+    for (nargs = 0; nargs < maxargs; nargs++) {
+        while (*str != 0 && strchr(sep, *str) != NULL) {
+            *str++ = 0;
+        }
+        if (*str == 0) {
+            break;
+        }
+        args[nargs] = str;
+        str = qtoken(str, sep);
+    }
+
+    return nargs;
+}
+