sub ask {
   my($promptString, $defaultValue) = @_;

   if ($defaultValue) {
      print $promptString, "[", $defaultValue, "]: ";
   } else {
      print $promptString, ": ";
   }

    $| = 1;               # force a flush after our print
    $_ = <STDIN>;         # get the input from STDIN (presumably the keyboard)

   chomp;

   if ("$defaultValue") {
      return defined $_ ? $_ : $defaultValue;    # return $_ if it has a value
   }
   return $_;
}

Get user input on the command line.

perl

Perl