Abstract: The present invention is related to systems and methods that parse and/or translate inbound messages into outbound messages such that disparate computer systems can communicate intelligibly. In one embodiment, a system recursively parses the inbound message such that relatively fewer outbound message structure definitions are required and advantageously decreases the usage of resources by the system. Further, one system in accordance with the present invention allows an operator to configure the identity of a delimiter in the inbound message. The delimiter can span multiple characters and includes the logical inverse of a set of delimiters. The outbound message can be accessed at nodes within a hierarchy, as well as at leaves. Thus, a user need not know the precise location of data within the outbound message. A set of updating rules further permits the updating of an outbound message without having to re-parse an entire inbound message.