Sorry, I am not sure I follow. Right now what I do is simply parse the *-ds.xml file using straight JAXP. While this works, is quick and has no dependencies on any binding framework (JAXB, JBossXB) I started thinking about it a bit more. The problems I see with this are 1) The element name mappings have to be hardcoded somewhere. Example: <min-pool-size/> <max-pool-size/> <connection-url/> <xa-datasource-property/> All of this stuff has to resolve to something in the MetaData, and then applied correctly to ServiceMetaData instances to construct and deploy the MBeans for a MCF. Right now I simply have a helper class that maintains a map of these values that the parser consults when processing the *-ds.xml file. It's this mess that I thought about replacing with something more extensible, ie, an aspectized parser where each aspect in the chain knows enough about the *-ds.xml format to construct the MetaData. As new elements get added to the *-ds.xml file, these aspects can be extended to accomodate this. 2) The parsing itself looks pretty ugly. Again, JAXP was used more as a convenience than anything else. It was *simple* from the perspective that I could get something up and running, but now I am rethinking the design. View the original post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&p=4022609#... Reply to the post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=posting&mode=reply&a...