; sub capture (&;*)
   { my $code = shift
   ; my $fh   = shift || select
   ; local $output     
   ; no strict 'refs'
   ; if ( my $to = tied *$fh )
      { my $tc = ref $to
      ; bless $to, __PACKAGE__
      ; &{$code}()
      ; bless $to, $tc
      }
     else
      { tie *$fh , __PACKAGE__
      ; &{$code}()
      ; untie *$fh
      }
   ; \$output
   }

##</code><code>##

use strict;
use warnings;
use XML::Simple;

; use Data::Dumper::Simple;

my $struct = XMLin('test.xml');
; print Dumper($struct);
if (defined $struct) {
    my $result_set = process_data($struct);
    ; print Dumper($result_set);
    send($result_set);
}

#...

##</code><code>##

perl -ne 'next if m{^\s*;\s*[^#]}; print $_' debugging.pl > stripped.pl

##</code><code>##

print <<HEREDOC
Some lines go here
HEREDOC
; #this would be filtered out if I didn't leave a comment