NAME

       Config::File - Parse a simple configuration file

SYNOPSIS

       use Config::File;

       my $config_hash = Config::File::read_config_file($configuration_file);

DESCRIPTION

       "read_config_file" parses a simple configuration file and stores its values in an anonymous hash
       reference. The syntax of the configuration file is as follows:

           # This is a comment
           VALUE_ONE = foo
           VALUE_TWO = $VALUE_ONE/bar
           VALUE_THREE = The value contains a \# (hash). # This is a comment.

       Options can be clustered when creating groups:

           CLUSTER_ONE[data] = data cluster one
           CLUSTER_ONE[value] = value cluster one
           CLUSTER_TWO[data] = data cluster two
           CLUSTER_TWO[value] = value cluster two

       Then values can be fetched using this syntax:

           $hash_config->{CLUSTER_ONE}{data};

       There can be as many sub-options in a cluster as needed.

           BIG_CLUSTER[part1][part2][part3] = data

       is fetched by:
           $hash_config->{BIG_CLUSTER}{part1}{part2}{part3};

       There are a couple of restrictions as for the names of the keys. First of all, all the characters should
       be alphabetic, numeric, underscores or hyphens, with square brackets allowed for the clustering. That is,
       the keys should conform to /^[A-Za-z0-9_-]+$/

       This means also that no space is allowed in the key part of the line.

           CLUSTER_ONE[data] = data cluster one      # Right
           CLUSTER_ONE[ data ] = data cluster one    # Wrong

Function "read_config_file"

   Syntax
           Config::File::read_config_file($file);

   Arguments
       $file is the configuration file.

   Return value
       This function returns a hash reference. Each key of the hash is a value defined in the configuration
       file.

   Description
       "read_config_file" parses a configuration file a sets up some values in a hash reference.

NOTES

   Function not exported by default
       In versions up to 1.0, the function read_config_file was exported to the calling program's namespace -
       Starting in version 1.1, nothing is exported by default. You can either fully qualify read_config_file or
       explicitly import it into your namespace:

       Fully qualifying read_config_file
             use Config::File;

             my $config_hash = Config::File::read_config_file($configuration_file);

       Explicitly importing read_config_file
             use Config::File qw(read_config_file);

             my $config_hash = read_config_file($configuration_file);

   Migrated away from ConfigFile into Config::File
       As of version 1.4, in order to include this module in the CPAN, I decided to move away from the highly
       unstandard name of ConfigFile and rename the module to Config::File. A small redirecting module is put in
       place, so current code using this module does not break, but the ConfigFile namespace usage is deprecated
       (and will thus issue a warning). Please update your code!

AUTHOR

       Development was started by Sebastien J. Gross <seb@sjgross.org>. Maintained by Gunnar Wolf
       <gwolf@gwolf.org> until 2018 when Stockholm University (Johan Wassberg and Mikael Nordin) took over
       maintainance.

       All rights reserved.  This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the
       terms of the GPL.

VERSION

       Version 1.54 Copyright (c) 2002 Sebastien J. Gross. All rights reserved.  Copyright (c) 2003-2018 Gunnar
       Wolf. All rights reserved.  Copyright (c) 2018- Stockholm University. All rights reserved.  This program
       is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GPL v2 (or later, at
       your choice).