can perl do it?

Irrespective of what the definition of "it" is, the answer is "yes."

I've used LWP::Simple for this kind of stuff and it works just swell. Here is some pseudo code -- 

1 connect to the site
2 authenticate
3 move to the "certain area"
4 determine the freshness of the patches
5 download

[download]

Heck, I just rewrote your original question. ;-)

--
when small people start casting long shadows, it is time to go to bed

In reply to Re: Automating downloads with Perl by punkish
in thread Automating downloads with Perl by yakkers

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