Methods for formatting a hierarchical data structure having structural elements (“HDS”) are provided. A branch in a directed acyclic graph is spawned. The graph includes a root node and a plurality of sub-nodes respectively corresponding to master and edited versions of the HDS, respectively. An edited version of the HDS is associated with a secondary instance of the HDS, and a change set corresponding thereto. The change set includes user edits. In the method first and second change sets are obtained and, responsive to a user selection, portions thereof are merged to produce a third change set. An additional secondary instance of the HDS is generated by applying the third change set to structural elements included in the master instance of the HDS. The additional secondary instance of the HDS is associated with an edited version of the HDS which, in turn, is associated with a sub-node in the graph.