That is a good plan, crashtest. For general-purpose parsing, I recommend XML::Twig for the combination of the following reasons:

• The API is superior to the others you have tried, offering method calls and xpaths.
• The extended documentation is fairly easy to follow, well-organized and comprehensive.
• The tutorial is easy to complete and extremely useful.
• The author is a PerlMonk and offers prompt support here at the Monastery.

I started out with XML::Parser and stuck with it for a while because I didn't even know others existed. A collegue made me aware of XML::Simple, but I have never used it because it is too limited for the XML I have.

When I discovered the CPAN Recommended Modules website, I tried using XML::LibXML, but I quickly became flustered. Then, I tried XML::Twig, and I haven't needed anything else since.

I marked this node as OT because it has nothing to do with solving the OP's specific problem regarding getting a parser to return more useful diagnostic messages.