A method for improving functionality of a binary representation of an XML-based content description, wherein a structure of any instance of an XML document corresponds to a tree-like data structure is provided. The method includes providing that each tree node represents an element of the content description and has a structure which is defined in a schema, providing the tree nodes in the binary representation with tree branch codes, providing that the respective tree branch code has a schema branch code and, when there are multiple occurrences of an associated child node based on the definition of the schema, a position code, and re-sorting a complete path such that all the position codes are moved to an end of the respective complete path, thereby enabling simpler filtering of the binary representation.