use IO::File; ... my $fileStream = new IO::File ("yourDocumentName.xml"); ... my $parser = new XML::Parser ( Handlers => { # Creates our parser object Start => \&hdl_start, End => \&hdl_end, Char => \&hdl_char, Default => \&hdl_def, } ); ... $parser->parse($fileStream); #### $parser->parsefile($filename)