The following wouldn't be through DBI (or Perl for that matter), but what about backing the database up using mysqldump ? While it is through the commandline, it's dumps out the contents of the db to SQL statements quite nicely. Updated following athomason's comment below:
Very strange. One might even say icky. Then I guess the best bet is to dump it out the way you're trying.
Removed by the admins... strange, isn't it? I asked them about how I could get a copy of my database, and they said I couldn't, flat out. Got me to thinking that if I ever tried to switch providers perhaps they wouldn't give me back my data. In any case, this seemed an interesting thing to try through DBI.
Reading this made my hair stand on end. I used to work with
a client who did exactly that (refused to give his client
their data). We left his sorry $#& in a hurry.