You should read up on the options for XML::Simple I think what's tripping you you up is the keyattr option. This defaults to name but you probably want it set to the empty string. You might also check out Data::Dumper to view the data structures that XML::Simple creates.

I've been using XML::Simple for reading in and writing out config files without any unwanted changes to the xml file so I'm pretty sure it will do what you want.

Hope this helps,
Ira,

"So... What do all these little arrows mean?"
~unknown