Yes, for simbolic manipulation it makes a lot of sense to have this format. I like very much the structure of the rhythmic trees of PW and Openmusic. For my personal use as a composer I created other kinds of representation that I work in SuperCollider and in the end I have some programs that translate this to Lilypond or OpenMusic notation (it's actually called 'common music notation'). BTW it's easier to translate to OM than to lilypond, and it is much faster. But it's more flexible to work with Lilypond.