17. A data processing apparatus, comprising: means for receiving an XML document in serialized format and for identifying one or more entities in the XML document; means for recognizing one or more names of elements of the XML and for recognizing one or more names of attributes of the elements; finite state automaton means comprising states and transitions representing structural relationships among elements and attributes of one or more structured path expressions and comprising look-ahead means for determining one or more active states of the automaton and one or more next states of the automaton; means for receiving, at a token processor, one or more messages comprising a structured electronic document in serialized format; means for identifying, at the token processor, one or more entities in the one or more messages; means for determining, at a name recognition engine, whether at least one entity of the one or more entities corresponds to at least one of the one or more next states of the automaton; means for sending to the automaton, from the name recognition engine, the at least one entity when the at least one entity corresponds to at least one of the one or more next states of the automaton; means for performing at the automaton, based on the at least one entity, one or more state transitions resulting in reaching a final state of the automaton; means for outputting the final state of the automaton; wherein the recognizing means further comprises means for generating a data table and a tree; wherein the tree comprises a root node corresponding to a character position in names of elements or attributes in the structured electronic document; means for walking the tree to seek a match for a name of a specified entity among the one or more entities; means for selecting a letter in a position specified by a label of the root node and comparing the selected letter to other letters that label links to a child node; means for determining that a specified entity's name is of no interest if the specified entity's name matches none of the other letters; means for traversing a link labeled by the letter when there is a match; means for comparing all remaining letters and determining a match upon reaching a leaf node.
17. A data processing apparatus, comprising: means for receiving an XML document in serialized format and for identifying one or more entities in the XML document; means for recognizing one or more names of elements of the XML and for recognizing one or more names of attributes of the elements; finite state automaton means comprising states and transitions representing structural relationships among elements and attributes of one or more structured path expressions and comprising look-ahead means for determining one or more active states of the automaton and one or more next states of the automaton; means for receiving, at a token processor, one or more messages comprising a structured electronic document in serialized format; means for identifying, at the token processor, one or more entities in the one or more messages; means for determining, at a name recognition engine, whether at least one entity of the one or more entities corresponds to at least one of the one or more next states of the automaton; means for sending to the automaton, from the name recognition engine, the at least one entity when the at least one entity corresponds to at least one of the one or more next states of the automaton; means for performing at the automaton, based on the at least one entity, one or more state transitions resulting in reaching a final state of the automaton; means for outputting the final state of the automaton; wherein the recognizing means further comprises means for generating a data table and a tree; wherein the tree comprises a root node corresponding to a character position in names of elements or attributes in the structured electronic document; means for walking the tree to seek a match for a name of a specified entity among the one or more entities; means for selecting a letter in a position specified by a label of the root node and comparing the selected letter to other letters that label links to a child node; means for determining that a specified entity's name is of no interest if the specified entity's name matches none of the other letters; means for traversing a link labeled by the letter when there is a match; means for comparing all remaining letters and determining a match upon reaching a leaf node. 18. The apparatus of claim 17 , wherein rows in the data table correspond to the names of elements or attributes in the structured electronic document, wherein columns in the data table correspond to characters of the names, wherein a column rank of each column comprises a maximum number of times that one of the characters occurs in that column, wherein the root is associated with one of the columns having a lowest column rank.