accessing the files through OLE might be the way to go
This question just came up again on the Chatterbox, and looking through CPAN I found a module (by Barbie): Mail::Outlook, which apparently is built on top of Win32::OLE. So you no longer have to start from zero.

In reply to Re^2: Reading an Outlook PST FIle by bart
in thread Reading an Outlook PST FIle by BaldPenguin

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