Thank you in advance. I am writing a short program, a game, that tests your knowledge of GNU/Linux commands and programs (with a whatis entry). I want it to put like flash cards: present the name of the command, wait for the user, then print the description, wait for the user, ad infinitum. The code below shows the first attempt (SLATHERED WITH COMMENTS):

#!/usr/bin/perl

#bashflash 
#tests your memory of bash/gnu-linux commands and cli programs
#USAGE:
#cd to the directory containing the binarys of the programs
#you want to test your knowledge of (DO NOT NEED TO BE ROOT)
#pass perl bashflash -`whatis --wildcard *`
#

use strict;
use warnings;

#The following loop utilizes a shift-and-push loop
#to shift the zeroth element of @ARGV out of the array, into a scalar,
#then push the scalar back into the array as the final element.

#effectively, this process lets one cycle through the output of
#`whatis --wildcard *` indefinitely, *while separating the 
#command names from their descriptions, like flashcards.*

#*In it's current implementation, @ARGV stores the output of `whatis`
#word by word: such that elements are delineated by spaces. 

my $currentcard; #this variable holds onto strings shifted off of @ARG
+V
                    #, prints them, then pushes it's contents
                    #back onto the end of ARGV

while (1) { #infinite loop START

    $currentcard = shift; #shift first element 
                            #of @ARGV into $currentcard
    print $currentcard;
    push (@ARGV, $currentcard); #push $currentcard 
                                    #(previously element 0) back onto
                                    #@ARGV as the last element
    <STDIN>; #Wait for user

} #infinite loop END


exit; #the script never gets here,
#but I always explicitly exit on the end of my Perl.
#and then an empty comment line

#
[download]

This program puts this to STDOUT:

sage@bash:/bin$ perl bashflash -`whatis --wildcard *`
bashflash: nothing appropriate.
kmod: nothing appropriate.
ntfsck: nothing appropriate.
ntfsdump_logfile: nothing appropriate.
ntfsmftalloc: nothing appropriate.
ntfsmove: nothing appropriate.
ntfstruncate: nothing appropriate.
ntfswipe: nothing appropriate.
plymouth: nothing appropriate.
plymouth-upstart-bridge: nothing appropriate.
running-in-container: nothing appropriate.
static-sh: nothing appropriate.
-bash
(1)
-
GNU
Bourne-Again
SHell
bunzip2
(1)
-
a
block-sorting
file
compressor,
v1.0.6
busybox
(1)
-
The
Swiss
Army
Knife
[download]

Note, each line after "-bash" had to be summoned by the return key, meaning that (as explained in the comments) @ARGV has stored the command line argument into new elements by word. (This is my current understanding, please correct me.)

my @currentcard; #this variable holds onto strings shifted off of @ARG
+V
                    #, prints them, then pushes it's contents
                    #back onto the end of ARGV

while (1) { #infinite loop START
    $_ = shift; 
    while (m#^(?!-\s)$#) {
        push (@currentcard, $_);
        $_ = shift;
    }    
    print @currentcard;
    push (@ARGV, @currentcard); #push $currentcard 
                                    #(previously element 0) back onto
                                    #@ARGV as the last element
    <STDIN>; #Wait for user

} #infinite loop END
[download]

my @currentcard; #this variable holds onto strings shifted off of @ARG
+V
                    #, prints them, then pushes it's contents
                    #back onto the end of ARGV

while (1) { #infinite loop START
    $_ = shift;
    my $witch = 1; 
    while ($witch) {
        push (@currentcard, $_);
        $_ = shift;
        if ($_ =~ m#^(-\s)$#) {
            --$witch;
        }
    }    
    print @currentcard;
    push (@ARGV, @currentcard); #push $currentcard 
                                    #(previously element 0) back onto
                                    #@ARGV as the last element
    <STDIN>; #Wait for user

} #infinite loop END
[download]

Above: an attempt, two of many, to get the "flash card" output I desire. My plan is to instead push the shifted elements of @ARGV onto an Array in a regexp-conditional loop, to attempt to match the "- " in the last element of Array, if it does match "- ", then the code should exit the loop and print everything it collected up to and including the "- ", then pushing it's content back onto the end of @ARGV, and waiting for the return key press. Or the logical equivalent, test positive for iteration with the lack of "- ", and keep adding to Array until shift adds a "- ". As above.

I have tried dozens of variations with positive and negative regular expressions, I even tried /.*/, but every time I try to group the output such that iterations of print are delimited by "- ", just I get blank lines.

Am I using push and shift incorrectly?

Prithee, great archons of perl, behelpeth me.