#prn-tab.pl
=pod

This program takes a text file like this

Field Name 1:   Value
Field Name 2:   Value
...
Field Name n:		Value
Field Name 1:		Value
...

and converts it into a tab-delimited file with field names in the first line. 
Blank lines between fields or records are ignored. Field name and value must be
separated by a colon followed by white space. The field values may contain 
colons but must not contain newlines. Fields may be empty, but every 
record must contain the same fields in the same order. 

Invoke it like this:

	perl prn_tab.pl inputfilespec > outputfilespec
	
=cut


#read non-blank lines into array
while (<>) { chomp; push @lines, $_ if m/:/ } ;

#extract field names and print header line
foreach $line (@lines) { 
	($name) = split /\:\s*/, $line;
	last if defined $processed{$name}; 
  $processed{$name}++;
  $name =~ s/\s/_/g; #convert spaces to underscores	  
  push @names, $name;
}
print join("\t", @names) . "\n";

#get name of last field so we can recognise end of record
($lastfield) = split /\:\s*/, $lines[-1];

#print records 
foreach $line (@lines) {
	($name, $value) = split /\:\s*/, $line, 2;
	unless ($name eq $lastfield) {
		print "$value\t"
	} else {
	  print "$value\n"
	}
}
__END__