13. An information storage medium having stored thereon program code executable by a computer system, the program code comprising: code that causes the computer system to receive from a user a first template document expressed in Rich Text Format (RTF); code that causes the computer system to read, via an RTF reader, a first portion of the template document; code that causes the computer system to dispatch, via the RTF reader, a first event to an RTF parser executing on the computer system, the first event including a type and one or more attributes associated with the first portion; code that causes the computer system to instantiate, via the RTF parser, a root data object based on the type and one or more attributes included in the first event, wherein the root data object includes a display method for outputting source code in Extensible Stylesheet Language (XSL); code that causes the computer system to read, via the RTF reader, a second portion of the first template document, wherein the second portion corresponds to a placeholder tag, a transformation tag, a block of static content, or a formatting attribute in the first template document; code that causes the computer system to dispatch, via the RTF reader, a second event to the RTF parser, the second event including a type and one or more attributes associated with the second portion; code that causes the computer system to instantiate, via the RTF parser, a child data object based on the type and one or more attributes included in the second event, wherein the child data object is instantiated as a child of the root data object in an object hierarchy, and wherein the child data object includes a display method for outputting source code in XSL; code that causes the computer system to generate, via the RTF parser, a second template document expressed in XSL by invoking the display method included in the root data object and the display method included in the child data object; and code that causes the computer system to combine the second template document with report data to generate a report.
13. An information storage medium having stored thereon program code executable by a computer system, the program code comprising: code that causes the computer system to receive from a user a first template document expressed in Rich Text Format (RTF); code that causes the computer system to read, via an RTF reader, a first portion of the template document; code that causes the computer system to dispatch, via the RTF reader, a first event to an RTF parser executing on the computer system, the first event including a type and one or more attributes associated with the first portion; code that causes the computer system to instantiate, via the RTF parser, a root data object based on the type and one or more attributes included in the first event, wherein the root data object includes a display method for outputting source code in Extensible Stylesheet Language (XSL); code that causes the computer system to read, via the RTF reader, a second portion of the first template document, wherein the second portion corresponds to a placeholder tag, a transformation tag, a block of static content, or a formatting attribute in the first template document; code that causes the computer system to dispatch, via the RTF reader, a second event to the RTF parser, the second event including a type and one or more attributes associated with the second portion; code that causes the computer system to instantiate, via the RTF parser, a child data object based on the type and one or more attributes included in the second event, wherein the child data object is instantiated as a child of the root data object in an object hierarchy, and wherein the child data object includes a display method for outputting source code in XSL; code that causes the computer system to generate, via the RTF parser, a second template document expressed in XSL by invoking the display method included in the root data object and the display method included in the child data object; and code that causes the computer system to combine the second template document with report data to generate a report. 14. The information storage medium of claim 13 , wherein the placeholder tag specifies a location for report data, wherein the formatting attribute specifies formatting of report data, and wherein the transformation tag specifies a transformation to be performed on report data.