#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

my %data = (    a01     => "two",
                a02     => "peas",
                a03     => "in",
                a04     => "a",
                a05     => "pod."
);

while (($_) = sort keys %data){

 print "while: $data{$_}\n";
 delete $data{$_};
}

print "while loop terminates because",
      "%data is now empty >", %data,"< \n";

__END__