If you want single key responses, see Re: Using File::Tail::select with STDIN? , where you don't need the Return key to capture a keystroke.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

my $question;
my $computer;
my @pc = qw(comp1 comp2 comp3 comp4 comp5);

# Find out which computer to cold start
system("clear");
do {
    print "Which computer would you like to cold start?\n";
    print "1 - comp1
2 - comp2
3 - comp3
4 - comp4
5 - comp5\n";
    $question = <STDIN>;

    chomp($question);

} until ($question >= 1) & ($question <= 5);

$question--;

$computer = $pc[$question];

print "$computer\n";
print "Hit Return to continue\n";
<>;  # wait for a newline
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This has nothing to do with your problem, but you might want to use a HEREDOC for your menu, like so:

do {
  print <<END;
Which computer would you like to cold start?
1 - comp1
2 - comp2
3 - comp3
4 - comp4
5 - comp5
END

...
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I downloaded the code as shown and it works exactly as expected. Clears the screen, shows the menu, quits on a valid selection, repeats menu on an invalide selection. Not sure what is wrong with your setup.

Also this might not be very useful or appealing if you can't get the basic script to work, but why not make the menu procedurally generated?

until ($question >= 1 and $question <= @pc) {
  print "Computer list:\n";
  print "$_)\t$pc[$_-1]\n" for (1..@pc);
  print "Which computer would you like to cold start? ";
  chomp($question = <STDIN>);
}
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You can move the until to the front, since $question is undef so it will always run at least once.

First of all thank you everyone for the responses and the suggestions. I've learned something today.

In particular, thanks for the HEREDOC suggestion. It just looks a little "cleaner" to me. Also, I will try to move the "until" to the front and see if that seems to clear up my problem.

use Term::UI;

my $term = Term::ReadLine->new('brand');
my @pc = qw(comp1 comp2 comp3 comp4 comp5);

my $reply = $term->get_reply(
                             prompt  => 'Which computer would you like
+ to cold start? ',
                             choices => \@pc,
                             default => 'none',
                            );
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Works fine for me using perl 5.8.8 on window XP. (I did have to change the "clear" command to "cls".)

I recommend using a prompt module such as IO::Prompt

perlvar says "STDOUT will typically be line buffered if output is to the terminal and block buffered otherwise." Maybe something about your circumstances has perl using block buffering on STDOUT. Try setting $|=1; to turn off buffering, and see if that helps.

I should say that I do not often write menu driven command line interfaces because they are hard to automate. The UI and process is just easier with a Unix style command.

Perhaps here ">cold comp5" would be better than a menu choice?

Anyway, first off, I do have a decided preference for while loops as opposed to do{...}until loops. The reason is that I like to see the loop ending condition at the front of the loop. But there is no real issue with using a do loop.

I guess the general "rules" are:
1) prompt the user in a clear way.
2) ignore completely any leading or trailing spaces.
3) a blank line is just a re-prompt (not an error).
4) protect the user from "faults" - if 0 is not allowed then that is an error input - error message and reprompt.
5) With a menu, have a clear way for the user to "quit" without going to the extreme of the CTRL-C.
6) Quality of error messages vary widely - application specific. There can be a lot of time spent on this. How much depends
upon who your users are. Same thing for help messages, etc.

Here is another way to write this menu loop:

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;

my $computer;
my @pcs = qw(comp1 comp2 comp3 comp4 comp5);

while ( $computer = prompt4number(@pcs),
        $computer !~/^\s*(Q|quit|exit)\s*$/i)
{
      next if $computer =~ /^\s$/; #simple re-prompt on blank lines
      
      if( $computer !~ /^\s*\d\s*$/ or $computer>@pcs or
          $computer == 0)
      {
         print "Illegal Entry -- try again!\n\n";
         next;
      }
      
      print "OK - cold starting $pcs[$computer-1]\n";
      exit(0); 
}

print "Program would just exit ...\n";

sub prompt4number
{
   my @pc = @_;
   print "\nWhich computer would you like to cold start?\n";
   
   my $menu =1;
   print $menu++, " - $_\n" foreach @pc; 
   print "enter Q|q|quit|exit to stop this program!\n";
   return <STDIN>;
}   
   
__END__
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