Perhaps something like this is what you want...... 
#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

my (%options,$curroption);

while(<DATA>) {    # read from __DATA__ filehandle below
  chomp;           # get rid of trailing newlines
  next if /^\s*#/; # skip if it the first nonspace char is '#'.

  # set the curroption if the first item in the line is in all caps
  $curroption = $1 if s/^([A-Z]+) //;  

  # make $currroption a hash key whose value is an array ref containin
+g
  # the various options we found.
  push(@{$options{$curroption}},$_) for (split(/,\s*/));  
}

# print the datastructure which is a HoA (Hash of Arrays);
for my $option (keys %options) {
  my @vals = @{$options{$option}};
  print "$option -- ", join (',',@vals), "\n";
}


__DATA__
# comment
# comment
ON Mon, Tues,
Fri,
Sat
# comment
other stuff

[download]
Output: 
ON -- Mon,Tues,Fri,Sat,other stuff

[download]

-Blake

In reply to Re: How do you read the next line in a file while in a loop? by blakem
in thread How do you read the next line in a file while in a loop? by GroundZero

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