dotty-progress

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;
$| = 1; # autoflush on

die "Usage: $0 <action> <number-of-lines>\n"
    unless @ARGV == 2;

my $action = shift;
my $number_of_lines = shift;

my $TOTAL_LINE_LENGTH = 78;
my $dots_length = $TOTAL_LINE_LENGTH - length($action) - 8;

print $action;

my $dots_so_far = 0;
for my $current_line (1..$number_of_lines) {
    my $line = <>;
    while ( $dots_so_far < int($current_line/$number_of_lines*$dots_length) ) {
        print '.';
        $dots_so_far++;
    }
}
print '.' x ($dots_length - $dots_so_far);