Parse::debcontrol is an easy oo way to parse debian control files and other colon separated key-value pairs. it's specifically designed to handle the format used in debian control files, template files, and the cache files used by dpkg.

for basic format information see: http://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-controlfields.html#s-controlsyntax

this module does not actually do any intelligence with the file content (because there are a lot of files in this format), but merely handles the format. it can handle simple control files, or files hundreds of lines long efficiently and easily.