The CGI qw/:standard/ just imports the functions and variables that CGI.pm lumps in the "standard" export group. That includes things like cookie(), header(), param(), blah blah blah.

Using CGI.pm and param() is a nice, easy way to get to the args passed to your program. Just instantiate a CGI object ($cur_cgi = CGI->new()) and use the param method with the name of arg you want to grab.

IOW: $arg = $cur_cgi->param('arg_name'); # grabs from GET and POST as 
+necessary
[download]

Of course, this only works really well when you know what args you'll be looking for. If you need something more dynamic, stick with parsing the QUERY_STRING in the way that best suits you.