use XML::Simple;
use Data::Dumper;

my $ref = XMLin(\*DATA);
print Dumper $ref;

__DATA__
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<list>
  <item>
    <name>item_name_1</name>
    <working>yes</working>
    <uptime>5</uptime>
    <downtime></downtime>
  </item>
  <item>
    <name>item_name_2</name>
    <working>yes</working>
    <uptime>5</uptime>
    <downtime></downtime>
  </item>
</list>