if you replace

while (my ($key, $value) = each %hash)
   {
[download]

with

foreach my $key (keys %hash)
   {
     my $value=$hash{$key};
[download]

, it will behave as you want, without risk of nasty side-effects.

(Which begs an efficiency question. Unfortunately, I'm not qualified to answer that one.)

--
Tommy
Too stupid to live.
Too stubborn to die.