Data::Dumper's Sortkeys method may help you.

johngg@shiraz:~ > perl -Mstrict -Mwarnings -MData::Dumper -E '
open my $inFH, q{<}, \ <<EOF or die $!;
[CELL_NAME1]
COMMENT           = "Perl parsing"
FIRST             = "TEST1"
SECOND            = "ID1"
THIRD             = 123
FOURTH            = "THREE"
FIFTH             = 12345
SIXTH             = 6789
SEVENTH           = QWERTY

[CELL_NAME2]
COMMENT           = "Tester"
FIRST             = "TEST2"
SECOND            = "ID2"
THIRD             = 1234
FOURTH            = "FOUR"
FIFTH             = 12345
SIXTH             = BOARD
SEVENTH           = MOUSE

[CELL_NAME3]
COMMENT           = "Parser"
FIRST             = "TEST3"
SECOND            = "ID3"
THIRD             = 12345
FOURTH            = "FIVE"
FIFTH             = 12345
SIXTH             = PAD
SEVENTH           = KEY
EOF

my %HoH = do {
   local $/ = q{};

   map {
      my @record = split m{\n};
      my $key    = shift @record;
      $key       =~ s{[\[\]]}{}g;

      $key       => { map { split m{\s*=\s*}, $_, 2 } @record };
      } <$inFH>;
   };

print Data::Dumper
   ->new( [ \ %HoH ], [ qw{ *HoH } ] )
   ->Sortkeys( 1 )
   ->Dumpxs();'
%HoH = (
         'CELL_NAME1' => {
                           'COMMENT' => '"Perl parsing"',
                           'FIFTH' => '12345',
                           'FIRST' => '"TEST1"',
                           'FOURTH' => '"THREE"',
                           'SECOND' => '"ID1"',
                           'SEVENTH' => 'QWERTY',
                           'SIXTH' => '6789',
                           'THIRD' => '123'
                         },
         'CELL_NAME2' => {
                           'COMMENT' => '"Tester"',
                           'FIFTH' => '12345',
                           'FIRST' => '"TEST2"',
                           'FOURTH' => '"FOUR"',
                           'SECOND' => '"ID2"',
                           'SEVENTH' => 'MOUSE',
                           'SIXTH' => 'BOARD',
                           'THIRD' => '1234'
                         },
         'CELL_NAME3' => {
                           'COMMENT' => '"Parser"',
                           'FIFTH' => '12345',
                           'FIRST' => '"TEST3"',
                           'FOURTH' => '"FIVE"',
                           'SECOND' => '"ID3"',
                           'SEVENTH' => 'KEY',
                           'SIXTH' => 'PAD',
                           'THIRD' => '12345'
                         }
       );

[download]

Update: Amended map { split m{\s*=\s*} } @record to map { split m{\s*=\s*}, $_, 2 } @record to address afoken's point.

Cheers,

JohnGG

In reply to Re^7: Parse a file and store it in hash of hashes by johngg
in thread Parse a file and store it in hash of hashes by Sonali

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