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

my $text=<<'XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX';
INPUT FILE =
# comment
# comment
ON Mon, Tues,
Fri,
Sat
# comment
other stuff

EXPECTED OUTPUT =
$on = Mon,Tues,Fri,Sat


XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
my %hash=(on=>undef,
          people=>undef);

my $line="";
#open IN,$0;    # uncomment me and replace the filehandle with
SCAN:while(<DATA>) { # IN and it still works!
   next if /^\s*[*#]/; # line comments begin with * or #
   chomp;
   $line.=$_;          # continue the line
   next if /,\s*$/;    # not done
   my $found;
   KEY:foreach my $key (keys %hash) {
   	 if (!defined($hash{$key}) && $line=~/^\s*$key\s*/i) {
   	 	$found=$key;
   	 	last KEY;
   	 }
   }
   next SCAN unless $found;
   $line=~s/^\s*$found\s*//i;
   $hash{$found}=[split(/\s*,\s*/,$line)]; # split away
   $line="";
}

# make printing easier
$"=","; $,=$\="\n";
print "$text--OUTPUT--\n";
$"="','";
foreach my $key (keys %hash) {
	next unless $hash{$key};

	print "#For Key '$key'";
	print "my \@$key=qw('@{$hash{$key}}');\n";
}
print "Hope this helps\n","Yves\n",":-)\n";

__DATA__
# comment
# comment
ON Mon, Tues,
Fri,
Sat
# comment
#INPUT FILE =
## comment
## comment
People Mary,   Bill, Jenny,   Petra  ,  Isolde, Joe
#ON Mon, Tues,
#Fri,
#Sat
## comment
#WISHFUL CODE =
##$infile = "test.txt";
##$linecounter = 0;
##open(INFILE, $infile)  || die "Can't open $infile : $!\n";
##MAIN:while(<INFILE>)
#
##   $linecounter++;
##   printf("File Line %s = %s",$linecounter, $_);
##   if ( /^\*/ || /^\#/ )  # Get rid of useless comments in file.
##   {
##       next MAIN;
##   }
##   chop;
##   if ( /^on/i )
##   {
##      hold_on = "";
##      undef(@junk);
##      @junk = split(' ', $_, 2);
##      $hold_on = $junk[1];
##      $len = length($hold_on) - 1;
##      $last_char = substr($hold_on, $len, 1);
##      while ( $last_char eq "," )
##      {
##         $read_line = readln(<INFILE>);
##         $read_line =~ chop($read_line);
##         $hold_on = "$hold_on$read_line";
##         $len = length($hold_on) - 1;
##         $last_char = substr($hold_on, $len, 1);
##      }
##      $hold_on =~ s/\s//g;
##   }
##   #other code
#
##printf("\$on = %s\n", $on);