I read in and parse the below XML fine, it populates a hash with the values I want. In one area I want to increment the nextSessionID from the XML read in and then write the XML document back. When I run the below I get the XML document overwritten with an element with all other named tags being attributes of the main tag. Starting XML

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
    <mainTag>
    <items>
        <nextSessionID>1000</nextSessionID>
    </items>
    </mainTag>
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After write I get

<?xml version='1.0'?>
<items nextSessionID="1001" />
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The segment of the program that deals with the XML document being read in and written out.

my $xmlSimp = XML::Simple->new();
my $xmlCont = $xmlSimp->XMLin($xmlPath);
my $varIn = "";  our %xmlHash;
foreach my $keyI (keys (%{$xmlCont->{"items"}})) {
    $varIn = $xmlCont->{"items"}->{$keyI};
    $xmlHash{$keyI} = $varIn;
    if ($keyI eq "nextSessionID") {
    $xmlCont->{"items"}->{$keyI} = ++$varIn;
    }
}
my $tmpOut = $xmlSimp->XMLout($xmlCont, 
        KeepRoot   => 1, 
        OutputFile => $xmlPath,
        XMLDecl => "<?xml version='1.0'?>"
            );
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