Your routine seems to encode the '/' character, which causes problems. Putting if ( $_ eq " ") {$out.="+";next}; inside the loop helps.

Update: Excuse me, I appear to have left my brain in my other pair of pants. Try this: ( $_ eq "/") {$out.="/";next};

Double update: Replacing space with a + character is a search enginism. %20 is the correct replacement.

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Jeremy
I didn't believe in evil until I dated it.