If you control the source, that's fine. I get externally generated documents containing an annoying mishmash of XML representing metadata and XML representing r

If you control the source, that's fine. I get externally generated documents containing an annoying mishmash of XML representing metadata and XML representing rendering logic. Sometimes the same stuff even represents both of these things. I take them apart to something flatter as early as possible, but the complexity is nevertheless unavoidable. (changing the upstream representation would involve changing an entire industry as well as a standard)