#maybe the next two lines can be combined -- I am not sure
use CGI::Carp qw(fatalsToBrowser);
use CGI qw/:standard :html2/;
#the standard also says if I set :html2, xhtml will go away (but it doesn't seem to have an effect).

#no idea how to set -dtd attributes
my $query = CGI->new;
    print $query->start_html(-title=>'Argh!',
    -background=>"../images/$SiteName.background.jpg",
    -link=>'brown',
    -vlink=>'#8b4513',
    -no_xhtml=>1, #this has no effect...
    -dtd=>'3.2 DTD' #this does the trick, but not listed in the standard as to how to set it -- I hope this is right...
}