Disclosed is a method (900) for communicating at least part of a structure of a document (104) described by a hierarchical representation (102). The method identifies (902) the hierarchical representation (eg. the tree structure) of the document (104). The identification is preferably performed using XML tags. The representation is then packetized (906) into a plurality of data packets. At least one link is then created (908) between a pair of the packets, the link acting to represent an interconnection between corresponding components (eg. structure and content) of the representation. The packets are then formed (910) into a stream for communication. The links maintain the hierachical representation within the packets.