In dealing with this class of tool, the most important data in the system is the metadata. Metadata is used to automatically generate the code that performs the neat tricks done by the system. If you want to make a big contribution to the system, be sure to work on the metadata. The metadata probably doesn't exist in your legacy systems, so the cool features of Informatica won't be available until the metadata has been generated.

One of the claims made by Informatica seems to be that they generate this sort of metadata automatically, for example by reading COBOL source code.

If you want to keep using perl, I would advise you to learn XS, due to this quote from Informatica's web site:

"Informatica MetaData Exchange SDK is implemented in C++ and offers an advanced object-based API for accessing and manipulating the Informatica Repository from different programming languages such as C, C++, Visual Basic, and Java."

A cool thing to do might be to make a perl module that creates Informatica access routines on the fly, based on the metadata that you get from XS routines written in C. The C routines would use the C-language API to access the metadata. Use the metadata to automatically generate perl methods to access the Informatica data.

This should effectively enable perl to be a first-class tool for working with Informatica, instead of being relegated to a minor role.

I have had lots of fun linking proprietary tools to perl. The DBD database drivers are examples of how this is done properly. In the Oracle and Informix systems that I have worked on, the DBD code links to a proprietary library when the module is installed. The proprietary library comes from the vendor as a binary, and the rest is available on CPAN. In some cases the vendor support for the CPAN module was better than the support for the rest of the vendor's system!

Try to attend meetings of Informatica users to find others interested in using perl. Also try to find the perl advocates within Informatica.

It should work perfectly the first time! - toma