As ikegami said, right up Perl's alley, and there might be something very close to what you need in Christiansen & Torkington's Perl Cookbook (O'Reilly, ISBN 0-596-00313-7). I think you will find the effort to learn Perl will be repaid, especially when you find yourself working in the context of rapid development.

However, as this is a professional application, it is important that it be provably correct. Like most people, I, and I suspect you, learn by making mistakes. Given the possibly intense time pressure you are under, do you want to wind up doing your 'learning' in front of your boss? It might be safer to 'just do it' in a language you know, i.e., C or C++, and learn Perl at a more leisurely pace in preparation for the next rush assignment.