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

my @answers = get_user_answers ("First Name", "Last Name");
print "User Said: @answers\n";

@answers = get_user_answers ("Animal1", "Animal2");
print "User Said: @answers\n";


#
# get array of answers to an array
#   of prompts. Any non-blank answer, that
#   is also a single space separated token is allowed
#
sub get_user_answers 
{
   my (@prompts) = @_;
   my @answers;
  
   foreach my $prompt (@prompts)
   {
      my $answer = prompt4answer($prompt);
      push (@answers, $answer);
   }
   return @answers;
}

#
# get a non_blank, single token answer
#   for a single prompt
#
sub prompt4answer
{
   my $prompt = shift;

   my $answer;
   while ( (print "$prompt: "), $answer = <STDIN>,
           $answer !~ /^\s*\S+\s*$/)
   {
      if ($answer =~ /^\s*\S+\s+\S+/)
      {
          print "Error! Only a single word allowed!\n";
      }
      # note: Simply re-prompts (no Error!) on a blank line
   }
   
   # Normal UI convention is to ignore leading and
   # trailing white spaces
   
   $answer =~ s/^\s*//;  # trim leading spaces
   $answer =~ s/\s*$//;  # trim trailing spaces
                         # also deletes line endings (\n)
   
   return $answer;
}

__END__
Example session:

C:\Projects_Perl\testing>perl UI_multi_prompt.pl
First Name:
First Name:  clark kent
Error! Only a single word allowed!
First Name:      clark
Last Name:  kent
User Said: clark kent

Animal1:   dog cat
Error! Only a single word allowed!
Animal1:
Animal1:       dog
Animal2: cat
User Said: dog cat