Game Changer: XBRL Viewer Add on for Firefox

Friday, October 29, 2010 at 09:01AM
Charlie in Creating Investor Friendly SEC XBRL Filings, Demonstrations of Using XBRL, Firefox XBRL add on

I was just made aware of something which will change the XBRL landscape.  Someone has created an XBRL add on for Firefox which allows you to view any XBRL instance or XBRL taxonomy. The XBRL add on lets you drag and drop the dimensions, reorganizing them like a pivot table!  The really cool thing is that the add on is free.

To get Firefox and the XBRL Add on and start viewing XBRL instances and XBRL taxonomies differently:

1. Get and install Firefox. I installed Firefox on my Mac.
2. Get the add on. Be sure to get Firefox first.  Simply copy the link into the address of your newly installed Firefox browser: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/77192/versions/?page=1#version-0.5.6l 
3. Get some XBRL instances.  Here is an RSS feed with about 53 XBRL instances.  Or, try this list of SEC XBRL filings. (Open the link, click on Detail the "Detail" column which takes you to the SEC web site, and then click on the XBRL instance.) Here is a direct link to one SEC XBRL instance, Coca Cola.

Again, be sure you are in Firefox when you open the XBRL instance or XBRL taxonomy.

So what does this mean?  Well, one thing it means is that it is easier to see data modeling errors within XBRL taxonomies which drive the XBRL instances.

I am sure this means other things but my mind is not working right now because this is so exciting.  Two things I wish: (a) I wish there were a plugin for Excel like this and, (b) I wish you could combine two or more XBRL instances and do comparisons.

More later.

 

 

Article originally appeared on XBRL-based structured digital financial reporting (http://xbrl.squarespace.com/).