Thank you for the feedback.

Archive::Tar::Stream was interesting, but it did not seem geared toward the type of problem I had. Also, I was trying to retain the use of the close(), getline(), and input_line_number methods from the IO::* modules, so I could localize my dependent logic to one place.

I do have the advantage (for this case) of not caring about the internal files themselves, just the data within them. For now, I will just "cheat" and use IO::Pipe and a call to tar with the appropriate compression switch ('j' or 'z' for Bzip2 or Gzip, respectively) and the 'O' option to send the output into the pipe (although I am willing to look at any suggestions, and appreciate any and all of them).