I probably would have converted the start/end month/day to GMT values and then iterated over them. Something like this:

#!/usr/bin/perl

use warnings;
use strict;
use POSIX qw(strftime);
use Time::Local;

my @breakfast = qw/bagel cereal toast yogurt/;
my @lunch     = qw/sandwich milkshake pb&j hoagie/;
my @dinner    = qw/pasta rice chicken steak/;

print "Enter start month (ie., for January, enter 1): ";
chomp(my $start_mon = <STDIN>);
print "Enter start day (ie., 20): ";
chomp(my $start_day = <STDIN>);
print "Enter end month (ie., for March, enter a 3): ";
chomp(my $end_mon = <STDIN>);
print "Enter end day (ie., 21): ";
chomp(my $end_day = <STDIN>);
print "Save to file [hit enter for default 'plan']: ";
chomp(my $file = <STDIN>);
$file ||= "plan";

my $start_gmt = timegm(0,0,0,$start_day,$start_mon-1,0);
my $end_gmt = timegm(0,0,0,$end_day,$end_mon-1,0);

open(FH, ">$file") or die "open: $!\n";
for (my $g = $start_gmt; $g <= $end_gmt; $g += 86400) {
    print FH my $d = strftime("%b %e", gmtime($g)), "\n";
    print "-" x length($d), "\n";
    print FH "Breakfast: $breakfast[rand @breakfast]\n";
    print FH "Lunch    : $lunch[rand @lunch]\n";
    print FH "Dinner   : $dinner[rand @dinner]\n";
    print "-" x length($d), "\n";
}
print "Written to file $file.\n";
close(FH);

[download]

There are all sorts of modules on CPAN dealing with dates and times that could have helped you out too.

PerlJam

In reply to Re: Critique by duff
in thread Critique by phenom

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