sub getProperties($)
{
    my ($propfile) = @_;
    my (%props);    # Return value: a hash of property values.
    my ($ln,$name,$value,@nv);

    open(PROPFILE,"$propfile") or die "Unable to open $propfile";
    while ($ln = <PROPFILE>)
    {
        chomp $ln;
        $ln =~ s/#(.*$)//;    # Remove line comments in the properties file.
        @nv = split /s*=/,$ln,2;
        $value = pop @nv;
        $value =~ s/^\s*=?\s*//;
        $value =~ s/\s*$//;
        $name = pop @nv;
        $name =~ s/^\s*//;
        $name =~ s/\s*$//;
        if ($name ne "")
        {
            $props{$name} = $value;
        }
    }
    close(PROPFILE);
    return %props;
}

sub dumpProperties
{
  my (%props) = @_;
  foreach $prop (keys %props)
  {
    #print "\t\t$prop\n";
    print "\t\t$prop:$props{$prop}\n";
  }
  1;
}