diff --git a/modules/Bio/EnsEMBL/Utils/IO/GFFParser.pm b/modules/Bio/EnsEMBL/Utils/IO/GFFParser.pm
index 43114be8b3daa0fbc2dc1292603894c423f49097..aa69c265f1dbd2098d14ae3118fad16964281d29 100644
--- a/modules/Bio/EnsEMBL/Utils/IO/GFFParser.pm
+++ b/modules/Bio/EnsEMBL/Utils/IO/GFFParser.pm
@@ -23,11 +23,10 @@ Monika Komorowska, 2012 - monika@ebi.ac.uk
 
 use strict;
 use Bio::EnsEMBL::Utils::IO::GFFParser;
-use FileHandle;
+use IO::File;
 
 my $file_name = "features.gff";
-my $fh = FileHandle->new;
-$fh->open("< $file_name");
+my $fh = IO::File->new($file_name, 'r');
 my $parser = Bio::EnsEMBL::Utils::IO::GFFParser->new($fh);
 
 my @header_lines = @{$parser->parse_header()};
diff --git a/modules/t/MultiTestDB.conf.example b/modules/t/MultiTestDB.conf.example
index 9002f09fbaba2eb5a63819fb3e1f2d63ad1fcd0f..84d84770775b8063d11ddd04041c75f7fcb1e37d 100644
--- a/modules/t/MultiTestDB.conf.example
+++ b/modules/t/MultiTestDB.conf.example
@@ -4,11 +4,16 @@
   'user'   => 'ensadmin',
   'pass'   => 'XXX',
   'host'   => 'ens-research',
-  'zip'    => 'test_genome.zip',
-
+  
   # add a line with the dbname and module
   'databases' => {
-    'homo_sapiens' => { 'core' => 'Bio::EnsEMBL::DBSQL::DBAdaptor' }
+    'homo_sapiens' => { 
+      'core' => 'Bio::EnsEMBL::DBSQL::DBAdaptor',
+      'empty' => 'Bio::EnsEMBL::DBSQL::DBAdaptor',
+    },
+    'circ' => {
+      'core' => 'Bio::EnsEMBL::DBSQL::DBAdaptor',
+    }
   },
 
   # uncomment to use preloaded databases (useful when doing lots of