# establish connection
my $socket = IO::Socket::UNIX->new(
     Peer    => '/path/to/socket.file.sock',
)

# issue command and read answer
print $socket "$some_command\n";
$html = "<html>". sockread($socket) "</html>";

sub sockread {
        my $socket = shift;
        my $content;
        while (my $line=<$socket>){
                $content .= $line;
                last if $line =~ /\[ End of /i;         # vlc's rc is a bit inconsistent, some end like this
                last if $line =~ / returned 0 /i;       # others like this
        }
        return $content;
}