Implementing XBRL in Your Organization: A Hands-On Introduction

Frequently Asked Questions

What is this course about? Extensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) is an XML-based, open standard language for the electronic communication of business and financial data. XBRL uses XML to represent reports that can be easily processed electronically and automated. XBRL is becoming a standard throughout the world for recording, storing and transmitting financial information due to the potential to deliver major cost savings, gains in efficiency and process improvements. In this course, you learn to implement XBRL in your organization for streamlined business and financial reporting. What background do I need? Experience with XML and related technologies are helpful, but not required. Who will benefit from this course? This course benefits anyone wanting to gain more knowledge about XBRL. Specifically, this course is geared towards technical personnel who need to implement XBRL, accounting personnel who need to produce reports in XBRL, and business/financial analysts who need to analyze financial statement products in XBRL. Does this course cover tagging business or financial data? Yes, this course covers how to tag data. The goal of XBRL is to develop a standard set of XML-type tags that can be used to create documents containing various kinds of information. This course covers the concept of data tagging and attendees perform many hands-on exercises related to this concept. Will I learn how to create standard financial and business reports? The focus of this course is on the XBRL standard and how to represent information as XBRL. This course does not cover details on how to create financial reports. Do I need to know XML for this course? Some familiarity with XML is helpful, but the course covers all of the XML and related technologies you will need to successfully implement XBRL in your organization. Will I learn XML in the course? Yes, but only in the context of using XBRL. This course covers the XML and related technologies (including schemas and namespaces) that you will need to understand XBRL. There is a great deal more to XML that will not be covered in this course. I work in accounting and have little knowledge of IT. Can I succeed in this course? Yes. While this course does cover many technical details of implementing XBRL, it is also useful for people with a non-technical background. What is a taxonomy? A taxonomy defines the specific tag names that are used to identify information within a specific report. Different taxonomies are defined for different financial reporting purposes. A taxonomy can be thought of as the dictionary that defines the valid values that can be contained within a report. What is an instance document? An instance document is a document that contains actual business data, or facts, and conforms to a specific taxonomy. Is this course specific to one vendor? No. XBRL is an open standard and this course follows this philosophy. The course focuses on the XBRL standard. How much time is spent on each topic? Content Hours Introduction to XBRL 1.5 Establishing a foundation for XBRL 2.0 Applying standard taxonomies 3.0 Building instance documents 2.5 Generating financial reports in XBRL 4.0 Analyzing and rendering XBRL 2.5 Creating custom taxonomies 1.5 Times, including the workshops, are estimates; exact times may vary according to the needs of each class. How much of this course is hands-on? Approximately 40 percent of class time is spent on hands-on exercises, allowing you to gain practical experience with XBRL. Exercises include creating a financial report in XBRL, developing an XBRL taxonomy, validating and sending XBRL reports, performing research by analyzing existing XBRL reports, and rendering XBRL reports as Web pages. How does this course relate to other Learning Tree courses? Learning Tree offers a number of courses that will help you expand upon the knowledge gained in this course and further your skills in several key areas. Those courses include: 542, XML: A Comprehensive Hands-On Introduction  940, Securing Web Applications, Services and Servers: Hands-On  424, Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA): A Comprehensive Hands-On Introduction  471, Java Programming: A Comprehensive Hands-On Introduction  575, Java and XML Application Development: Hands-On  502, Programming with .NET: A Comprehensive Hands-On Introduction  489, JavaScript for Web Development: Hands-On  296, Project Management: Skills for Success  315, Developing User Requirements: The Key to Project Success

XBRL is a registered trademark of XBRL International, Inc.