programmatically modifying the panel (add/remove launchers)
 

I'm writing a set of perl scripts to customize a freshly-installed Fedora Core 2 system.
I'd like to get rid of most of the default panel icons and add ones for the Terminal, etc.

So, the Q is: Is there any way to do this programmatically, i.e. via commands that I could invoke from a script, rather than via GUI interaction?

If not, some wizard might give me an idea of how to write a simple C program to do this, which I could then install and invoke. [Clearly not the preferred solutions, but it might be fun]

Thanks.