1. At a computer system including one or more processors and system memory, the computer system also including a workflow framework, a method for reading values of a compound data structure using a declarative language, the method comprising: receiving developer input, at the workflow framework, that defines, in the declarative language, multiple paths and a workflow program location for each path, each path defining an element of the compound data structure whose value is to be bound to the corresponding workflow program location; for each path, determining which element of the compound data structure the each path refers to and reading the value of the determined element from the compound data structure, wherein the each path refers to an element of another compound data structure that is nested within the compound data structure; and assigning the value of the element of the compound data structure to the corresponding workflow program location, including automatically performing a type coercion on the value based on the workflow program location.