Page 1 Building User Friendly Taxonomies Charles Hoffman, CPA ([email protected])...

Building User Friendly Taxonomies

Charles Hoffman, CPA

([email protected])

Director of Innovative Solutions, UBmatrix

Your Takeaways

Usability does matter

Characteristics of a user friendly taxonomy

Where to find best practices guidance

Provide feedback to XBRL International

Provide feedback to software vendors

Usability Does Matter

What Dogs Here

What Taxonomy Creators Here

Taxonomy Creators

SubjectMatter

Experts

Bad Organization

Good Organization

Regulations

Spreadsheet

Characteristics of a User Friendly Taxonomy

A classification system

Provide documentation and/or references to understand what is being classified

– Creation of taxonomy– Use of taxonomy

Recognizable to the user

Consistent

Categorized to facilitate use

Modular

Hide the techie stuff

A Classification System

Example of No Documentation or References

Concept:

– Cash

Are you SURE the users understand what you mean? How do you know?

Example of Documentation or References

Concept:

– Cash

Documentation:

– Cash includes cash on hand, cash in the bank, petty cash, short term investments easily convertible into cash, and anything with similar characteristics

References:

– http://www.xasb.org/xfrs/references/Cash – XFRS 1, section 2, paragraph A, clause iii

Sometimes documentation is best, sometimes references, sometimes both

Example of Inconsistency

Pro forma

Pro-forma

Proforma

Pro-Forma

Imagine these inconsistencies while attempting to read or use some search tool for finding things in the taxonomy

Example of Consistency

Pro forma

Pro forma

Pro forma

Pro forma

Consistency in EVERYTHING

If you are not attempting to be consistent, you are being inconsistent (whether you realize it or not)

Example of Not Recognizable

AFS

Example of Recognizable

Available-for-Sale

Avoid acronyms

Attempt to determine what is recognizable to the users, then what you create will be recognizable

Example of Poor Categorization

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Example of Good Categorization

One

– Two– Three

Four

– Five– Six– Seven– Eight– Nine

Ten

– Eleven– Twelve

Rule of “Sevens”; try not to have a list with more than seven things in it, break things up

Too many categories can also make things hard to read or use

Example of Poor Modularity

10,000 concepts in one schema file

Financial institutions and non-financial institutions together

– 10,000 financial institutions– 10,000,000 non-financial institutions

Example of Good Modularity

10,000 concepts in multiple schema files

– Labels in one file– Documentation in another file

Separated by who uses them

– Financial institutions separate from non-financial institutions

Break things up so users can use what they need, and are not forced to deal with things they don’t need

Example of NOT Hiding the Techie Stuff

http://www.xbrl.org/roles/label/standard

Example of Hiding the Techie Stuff

Standard Label

Techniques for Hiding Techie Stuff

Use of definitions in extended links

Use of documentation element in linkbases

Etc.

Best Practice Guidance

FRTA

USFRTF Style Guide

Modeling Financial Reporting Concepts in Taxonomies (Patterns Document)

Other taxonomies

The Chicago Manual of Style

Provide Feedback to XBRL International

To improve XBRL specification

To improve best practices

Provide Feedback to Software Vendors

Software can help you create user friendly taxonomies

Your Takeaways

Usability does matter

Characteristics of a user friendly taxonomy

Where to find best practices guidance

Provide feedback to XBRL International

Provide feedback to software vendors

Questions and Discussion

[email protected]

Page 1 Building User Friendly Taxonomies Charles Hoffman, CPA ([email protected])...

Documents

Transcript of Page 1 Building User Friendly Taxonomies Charles Hoffman, CPA ([email protected])...