Digital Financial Reporting

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I have updated the core financial integrity analyzer prototype which I made available last year.  The prototype is built in Microsoft Excel and hooks to numerous sets of SEC XBRL financial filings.  This version runs on version 6 of the Microsoft XML parser, the older version runs on version 4 of that parser.

This prototype works on most 10-K and 10-Q filings.  It looks for core financial pieces such as "assets", "liabilities and equity", "net income" and "net cash flow" to see if they exist.  Most filings have these concepts.  The prototype does not handle all situations correctly (i.e. that is why it is a prototype and not production quality).  But, it does helps one understand the notion of core financial reporting semantics, what core financial reporting semantics exist and what they look like.

I have updated the logical model viewer so that it works with version 6 of the Microsoft XML parser.  I also fixed some bugs which makes this prototype more stable. (Note that this older version works with version 4 of the Microsoft XML parser.)

The prototype works with the:

• Metapatterns: Documentation | RDF list
• Business use cases: Documentation | RDF list
• Comprehensive example: Documentation | RDF list
• SEC Model/Reference implementation: Documentation | RDF list (additional documentation)

The logical model is explained in the document Modeling Business Information Using XBRL.  This document contains the most current information. 

There is one potentially confusing thing worth pointing out. All this logical model work started with what was called XBRLS.  While the ideas behind XBRLS were good, the ideas have matured.  The Business Reporting Logical Model (BRLM) developed by the XBRL International Taxonomy Architecture Working Group is the best model which I have seen.  I have applied those ideas to SEC XBRL financial filings, changing only the terms of the BRLM, applying the US GAAP Taxonomy terminology.  The two primary differences are terms "Table versus Hypercube" and "Axis versus Measure".  I realize that this can be confusing, sorry for any inconvenience.