--- pathauto.inc	2008-06-18 15:02:40.000000000 -0500
+++ pathauto.inc.new	2009-04-05 14:32:50.000000000 -0500
@@ -139,6 +139,7 @@ function pathauto_cleanstring($string, $
 
   // Replace or drop punctuation based on user settings
   $separator = variable_get('pathauto_separator', '-');
+  $separator_alt = variable_get('pathauto_separator_alt', '--');
   $output = $string;
   $punctuation = pathauto_punctuation_chars();
   foreach ($punctuation as $name => $details) {
@@ -148,6 +149,10 @@ function pathauto_cleanstring($string, $
       // Slightly tricky inline if which either replaces with the separator or nothing
       $output = str_replace($details['value'], ($action ? $separator : ''), $output);
     }
+    else if ($action == 3) {
+    // 3 is option for using the alternative separator
+      $output = str_replace($details['value'], ($action ? $separator_alt : ''), $output);
+    }
   }
 
   // If something is already urlsafe then don't remove slashes
@@ -174,7 +179,12 @@ function pathauto_cleanstring($string, $
   // Reduce to the subset of ASCII96 letters and numbers
   if (variable_get('pathauto_reduce_ascii', FALSE)) {
     $pattern = '/[^a-zA-Z0-9\/]+/ ';
+    if ($separator_alt) {
+      $output = preg_replace($pattern, $separator_alt, $output);
+    }
+    else {
     $output = preg_replace($pattern, $separator, $output);
+    }
   }
 
   // Get rid of words that are on the ignore list
@@ -192,18 +202,33 @@ function pathauto_cleanstring($string, $
 
   // In preparation for pattern matching,
   // escape the separator if and only if it is not alphanumeric.
-  if (isset($separator)) {
-    if (preg_match('/^[^'. PREG_CLASS_ALNUM .']+$/uD', $separator)) {
-      $seppattern = $separator;
+  if (isset($separator) || isset($separator_alt)) {
+    if ($separator_alt) {
+      if (preg_match('/^[^'. PREG_CLASS_ALNUM .']+$/uD', $separator_alt)) {
+        $seppattern = $separator_alt;
+      }
+      else {
+        $seppattern = '\\'. $separator_alt;
+      }
     }
     else {
-      $seppattern = '\\'. $separator;
+      if (preg_match('/^[^'. PREG_CLASS_ALNUM .']+$/uD', $separator)) {
+        $seppattern = $separator;
+      }
+      else {
+        $seppattern = '\\'. $separator;
+      }
     }
     // Trim any leading or trailing separators (note the need to
     $output = preg_replace("/^$seppattern+|$seppattern+$/", '', $output);
 
     // Replace multiple separators with a single one
+    if ($separator_alt) {
+      $output = preg_replace("/$seppattern+/", "$separator_alt", $output);  
+    }
+    else {
     $output = preg_replace("/$seppattern+/", "$separator", $output);
+    }
   }
 
   // Enforce the maximum component length
@@ -303,7 +328,11 @@ function pathauto_create_alias($module, 
 
   // If the alias already exists, generate a new, hopefully unique, variant
   $separator = variable_get('pathauto_separator', '-');
+  $separator_alt = variable_get('pathauto_separator_alt', '--');
   if (_pathauto_alias_exists($alias, $src, $language)) {
+    if (isset($separator_alt)) {
+      $separator = $separator_alt;
+    }
     $original_alias = $alias;
     for ($i = 0; _pathauto_alias_exists(drupal_substr($alias, 0, $maxlength - strlen($i)) . $separator . $i, $src, $language); $i++) {
     }