Thanks again for your help, bikeNomad. I think I finally figured out what was malfunctioning in Ovid's original code.

• I used my $file_handle = $req->upload("FILE$onnum"); instead of my $file_handle = $req->upload($file);
• I used open(OUTFILE, ">" . UPLOAD_DIR . $fileName) instead of the sysopen command. Not sure WHY it worked, but it worked.

I think the thing that confused me most was that $file_handle was acting like both a standard scalar string and a filehandle, since I could print $file_handle and get a readable filename/directory - most of the times if I see a reference, it looks like... a reference.

CGI::Carp definitely helped out... It's much more useful to get error feedback instead of a vague "this didn't work" error! Thanks again for your help!!