The data:
 
https://www.dropbox.com/s/hj6myrr9yqk5uu7/data.txt?dl=0

[download]
I need to concatenate records that match the first field - it's delimited by space. Data is sorted and can have instances of 1-5 records to be concatenated. I.E. 
123 abc 
123 32434
123 sdfd
becomes 
123 abc 123 32434123 sdfd

[download]
I speak UNIX C and Progress RDBMS but am curious about Perl's abilities. Invoking the code can be as simple as type infile > perl proc.pl > outfile or perl proc.pl infile outfile dealer's choice, but flexibility is valued.

In reply to Concatenate records by Shalmaneser

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