AbstractA procedure for the identification and separation of unknown compounds by capillary gas chromatography is described. The procedure involves a live retention time database and optimization of the separation. After initial chromatography of the sample, a rough search lists all the possible compounds it might contain and the analyst then uses his experience to discard those compounds in the list which are unlikely to be present. The multi‐component separation is then optimized over the whole range of defined starting temperatures and programming rates, in order to produce the best possible separation of the sample components, and the chromatography repeated using the results obtained from the optimization procedure. Further search operations within a given search window will then report the compound names, and related information, for each peak.Since the identification operation is performed at least twice during the procedure, and the optimization of the separation assists the identification by separating possibly overlapped peaks, the confidence of the qualitative analysis is higher than may be obtained using standards alone. If the reproducibility of isothermal indices measured on columns could be guaranteed, this procedure could be used instead of performing chromatography on standards of the compounds contained in the database, regardless of changes in column dimensions, phase ratio, and operating conditions in temperature programmed analysi