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WEVERKA, P., AND W. S. SO. XBRL for Dummies (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Publishing, Inc., 2008, ISBN: 978-0-470-22874-6, 88 pages, Free except for a small shipping charge)
XBRL for Dummies is written in the style of other books produced under the "Dummies" imprint. The key features of the imprint are: (1) a nontechnical, "plain English," direct-to-the-point writing style; (2) the use of icons such as "remember," "technical stuff," "tip," and "warning;" and (3) "top 10 lists." Unlike most other Dummies books, this one is provided on a complementary basis, except for a small postage charge, from Hitachi Incorporated. Hitachi has a significant stake in the success of extensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL); however, other than a small ad on the inside cover page and the last page, the book is not simply a marketing tool for Hitachi. This book can fill faculty and student needs (teaching or research) for an introduction to XBRL.
XBRL issues have been a hot topic in both practice and academia. The SEC adopted rule amendments to establish the Voluntary Filing Program (VFP) in March 2005 from which the filings from the first test group of participants began in 2006. Yet, the authors' provision (in the Introduction) of the following 2006 Grant Thornton International survey of Chief Financial Officers statistics appears to paint a different picture of XBRL awareness: (1) 85 percent of respondents felt that the benefits of XBRL had not been communicated by the accounting profession and (2) half of the respondents thought the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) would mandate XBRL. Nevertheless, on May 14, 2008, the SEC announced a plan to phase in the requirement to furnish XBRL instance documents. And on August 19, 2008, the SEC announced the replacement of EDGAR with the new Interactive Data Electronic Application (IDEA) system which will leverage the benefits of interactive data (XBR) for investors. Chapter 1 begins with a discussion of the SEC support for XBRL.