Lately I've taken to just writing short perl scripts like

use Storable qw/lock_nstore/;

my $cfg = {
  ## configuration data here
};

lock_nstore($cfg => '/some/file/name/here');
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Of course, avoid doing this for truly massive (> 10,000 items) data structures, as your server process memory consumption will just eat you alive.

You could also use mod_perl directives and stick it right in your apache config file. Many mason apps already have a fair amount of stuff in the apache config file.

Try something like:

<Perl> 
Package MyAppConfig;
my $cfg = {
    DBMpath => '/foo/bar/quux',
    salt    => 'NaCl',
    baseDir => '/baz/bar/foo',
};
sub salt {
    my ($class,$salt) = @_;

    $cfg->{salt} = $salt if $salt;

    return $cfg->{salt};
}
# Write accessors/mutators as desired for the other elements too.
</Perl>
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You should be able to access the config from your Mason app. The accessor/mutators aren't realy necessary, they just make accessing data a bit cleaner. If you write accessors, consider putting them in an actual separate module file. Then put only the $cfg variable in your apache config (or go all out and set the values with mutator sub calls).

<Perl>
MyAppConfig->salt('NaCl');
MyAppConfig->DBMpath('/foo/bar/gack');
</Perl>
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PerlAddVar MySalt NaCl
PerlAddVar MyDBMPath /foo/bar/yak
PerlAddVar MyBaseDir /bar/foo/mkay
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my $salt = $r->dir_config->get('MySalt');
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What is best really depends on your needs. It may not even make sense for you to put the configuration in your apache configuration.

Good luck.

Thanks for all of the replies everyone. I think I'll go with TGI's suggestion and store the pieces of information as PerlAddVar directives that I'll stick in the config file.

I've found that you can put these directives in a local .htaccess file in addition to the httpd.conf file, which makes everything easier. I can create this file during installation without much difficulty.