8. The method according to claim 7 , wherein the data structure or procedural function calls comprise a document object model tree.
7. A method of parsing a plurality of portions of a hierarchically organized data document in parallel, comprising: providing a hierarchical skeleton of the data document, the hierarchical skeleton representing a hierarchical arrangement of data document elements, wherein at least one node of the hierarchical skeleton has a plurality of subtrees; providing a plurality of processors, each processor executing in parallel; automatically allocating to the plurality of processors respective tasks, each task representing a parsing operation on an element of the data document selected in dependence on the hierarchical skeleton; generating a set of tasks by iteratively removing a remaining branch of the hierarchical skeleton which represents a largest task, and elevating the root of the subtree represented by the largest task to a next higher level, wherein a sufficient number of tasks is generated to permit efficient balancing, wherein an assignment of tasks to respective processors is balanced; and automatically generating a data structure or procedural function calls representing the parsed data structure elements.