Introducing iNEWS, a Monthly Update of XBRL Developments
There are so many email newsletters out there, and if everybody is like me many of them remain mostly unread. Great sources of XBRL related news abound – the news feed at xbrl.org, some very comprehensive daily Twitter summaries, and many others.
IPHIX just released the first issue of iNEWS, a monthly newsletter that provides a list of key XBRL updates, and one may wonder why we felt that it could be useful.
The idea is to provide a one-stop source of relevant XBRL developments and of key non-XBRL stories from the financial reporting world, just in case you missed those in your other reading. They are organized as a simple list of links that can be opened and read quickly. Occasionally we’ll add our two cents on matters if we think it’s useful. But mostly we’ll just give you the links, so you can quickly get up to speed and move on. The links are organized in sections — such as Recent Developments, Blogs, Articles, Presentations and Webcasts — that will make it even easier to quickly identify what you may be interested in, and ignore the rest.
I believe that its format and the way its content is organized will make of iNEWS a useful resource. You can find the first issue here.
If you like what you see, please subscribe. And if you have comments or suggestions, please let me or our editor Bob Schneider know. Happy reading!
XBRL FAQ: What is the difference between XBRL and XBRL GL?
| Q What is the difference between XBRL and XBRL Global Ledger? |
| A “XBRL” is a set of technical specifications that define how to create XBRL taxonomies. XBRL Global Ledger (XBRL GL) is a XBRL taxonomy.Sometimes this question has a different implicit meaning: what is the difference between XBRL GL and other XBRL taxonomies? So let me answer this one as well.
From a technical standpoint, there is no difference between XBRL GL and other XBRL taxonomies, such as the IFRS taxonomy, the US-GAAP taxonomy, or the Standard Business Reporting (SBR) taxonomies. Each XBRL taxonomy has a different architecture – basically, a set of rules that defines the way in which the various technical tools and features defined in the XBRL Specifications must be used within the taxonomy itself. The reason why a taxonomy architecture is necessary is that not all the technical features defined in the XBRL Specifications are always all relevant in all situations, and different types of information being represented by a taxonomy require different subsets of features that are more suitable to represent them. The taxonomy architecture identifies the subset of XBRL technical features that must be used to create and maintain a specific taxonomy, and provides guidance on how to use them. XBRL GL, like any other XBRL taxonomy, has its own architecture, consistent with the type of information that it represents and the requirements that it needs to meet in order to support its business purpose. From a business standpoint, each XBRL taxonomy is designed to achieve a certain purpose. The business purpose of many XBRL taxonomies is to support the creation of specific reports, such as “financial statements according to the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS)” or “financial statements according to the US GAAP.” Others have a broader business purpose. For example, the purpose of the Standard Business Reporting (SBR) taxonomy is “supporting all the reports that businesses must submit to the participating agencies in the Australian Government.” The XBRL GL taxonomy is provides a standardized representation of the business information found in any accounting and operational software application, and of the rules used to populate end reports (typically represented by other XBRL taxonomies) with that information. In practice, this means that the business purpose of the XBRL GL taxonomy is to enable the creation of standardized, application-independent and purpose-independent processes to access, monitor, analyze, and report on business data. |
IPHIX’s XBRL Inside Training: Leveraging XBRL to cut costs, streamline operations, and boost ROI
I am very encouraged by the positive feedback after the first edition of the XBRL Inside training classes in March 2012, and also by the reactions that I am still getting from those who attended my hands-on sessions at the 24th XBRL International Conference in Abu Dhabi. Those sessions were inspired by the same idea behind XBRL Inside: providing practical tools and actionable knowledge on leveraging XBRL within a business or an organization to those who can benefit from it the most – business users who constantly deal with manual, costly, and inefficient processes to access, control, analyze and report on business data.
I am also encouraged to see growing interest around this approach from small businesses (SME) and not-for-profit organizations (NFP). And since publicly available examples of the benefits of this approach from SMEs and NFPs are now available – such as the Maryland Association of CPAs (MACPA) case study and the recent press release from XBRL International, Inc. – and more will become available in the near future I expect that it will be easier and easier to make the point that XBRL is not just about compliance to a regulatory mandate and it is not something that only large, global corporations subject to such a mandate should consider.
XBRL Inside is the first and only training course that focuses on XBRL as the enabler of internal data-related process benefits and cost savings. I did my best to distil in it the hands-on experience that I accumulated over the years as one of the main proponents, and certainly the main implementer, of the combined use of XBRL Global Ledger and other XBRL taxonomies within the corporate information system. I know for a fact that those who attend will be able to put their newly acquired knowledge to work immediately and that by doing so they will gain more understanding of the possibilities and will find more and more ways to leverage XBRL in their day-to-day activities.
I definitely look forward to the upcoming sessions – we will hold one every month, next up is May 8 2012 – and to the interaction with the attendees after they go back and start applying what they learned. That is by far the most exciting, and rewarding, part.
Check the calendar here and register!
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