perl germanCharProblems.pl -opt wordae="ärgerlich" -opt wordoe="börse" -opt wordue="übersicht" 

##</code><code>##

#!perl
use strict;
use warnings; 

#cpan  modules.
use Getopt::Long; # Option handling

###################
# GLOBAL VARS
###################

# Our options
my %options;

# Grab the options from the command line
GetOptions ("opt=s" => \%options);

wipe_log();

for (keys %options) {
	logMessage('$options{' . "$_" . '}' . ": $options{$_} \n" );
}
#outputs: 
#$options{wordoe}: b÷rse 
#$options{wordue}: ³bersicht 
#$options{wordae}: õrgerlich 

for (keys %options) {
	$options{$_} = strange_dos_chars_to_germanchars($options{$_});
	logMessage('$options{' . "$_" . '}' . ": $options{$_} \n" );
}
#outputs:
#$options{wordoe}: börse 
#$options{wordue}: übersicht 
#$options{wordae}: ärgerlich 

# Takes a variable and spits it back out with the proper german characters
sub strange_dos_chars_to_germanchars {
	my $var = shift;
	my %table = (	'ß' => '¯' , 
					'ä' => 'õ' , 
					'ö' => '÷' , 
					'ü' => '³' , 
					'Ä' => '-' , 
					'Ö' => 'Í' , 
					'Ü' => '_');
	while (my ($k,$v) = each %table) {
		$var =~ s/$v/$k/g;
	}
	return $var;
}

sub wipe_log {
	my $logFileName = "log.txt";
	open F, "> $logFileName" or die "Cannot open log file: $logFileName";
	close F;
}

sub logMessage {
	my $message = shift;
	my $message = "$message\n";
	print $message; # maybe could turn this on and off with command line option.  do later?

	my $logFileName = "log.txt";
	open F, ">> $logFileName" or die "Cannot open log file: $logFileName";
	print F $message,"\n";
	close F;	
}