Hard Rules and Soft Rules for XBRL

Abstract

In January 2009, the SEC issued its final mandate for conversion to XBRL standards for financial statement reporting. However, the implementation has been painfully slow in the United States. In this article, I will investigate the factors impeding the XBRL conversion progress. I will recommend some available XBRL software for the “bolt-on,” “built-in,” and “deeply embedded” implementations. I will also try to help the readers understand all the major components of the XBRL taxonomy.