note
Thelonious
[cpan://XML::Simple]'s interface is pretty odd in that it outputs something different than it takes in by default. (Maybe it could be even a little more simple - and more Perlish...?) But there's an option:
<p/>
<blockquote><i><pre><tt class="code"><font size="-1">
ForceArray => 1 *# in - important*
This option should be set to '1' to force nested elements to be
represented as arrays even when there is only one.
</font></tt></pre>
</i></blockquote>
...that you can use like so:
<p/>
<code>
use XML::Simple;
my $xml = XMLin(join('',<DATA>),ForceArray => 1);
print XMLout($xml);
__END__
<meta fpi="1234567890">
<isbn>1-234-56789-0</isbn>
<edition>First</edition>
<authorgroup>
<author>
<firstname>John</firstname>
<surname>Smith</surname>
<authorblurb url="http://www.someurl.com/etc/nothing.php"/>
</author>
</authorgroup>
<pagenums>384</pagenums>
<pubdate>October 2001</pubdate>
<subjectset>
<subject>some.lame.subject</subject>
<subject>another.lame.subject</subject>
</subjectset>
<publisher>
<publishername>Publisher Inc.</publishername>
<imprintname>Publisher Inc.</imprintname>
</publisher>
</meta>
</code>
<p/>
...I think that it outputs something very similar to what you're looking for...
<p/>
hth
441290
441290