For the platofrm generic way, I would direct your attention to the core module File::Copy.

From the perldoc pages, I quote

  If possible, move() will simply rename the file.
  Otherwise, it copies the file to the new location and
  deletes the original.  If an error occurs during this
  copy-and-delete process, you may be left with a
  (possibly partial) copy of the file under the
  destination name.

which seems to handle both the platform dependant issues as well as the the question jrsmith asked.

Mik
Mik Firestone ( perlus bigotus maximus )