Draft guidance on versioning published
XBRL International has recently published two new guidance items describing best practices in managing and communicating changes to taxonomies. As taxonomies are regularly updated, it’s important that involved stakeholders follow best practices to ensure that the transition to the new taxonomy version is well prepared for and unfolds smoothly.
Regulators release new taxonomies to reflect business and technical changes to reporting requirements. The first piece of guidance, How to communicate changes between taxonomy versions, is targeted towards taxonomy authors and architects who make changes and need to let users of all kinds know what they are. Effective communication in this area can help stakeholders understand the impact of changes and plan required actions.
The second piece of guidance, How to manage taxonomy versioning, provides best practices for managing taxonomy versioning (for public release). Taxonomies are released as part of regular update cycles or on an ad-hoc basis to address business requirements, technical solutions, or fixes. The guidance includes details on information that should be provided. It is targeted towards taxonomy authors and taxonomy architects.
Read the guidance on communicating the changes between taxonomy versions here, and managing taxonomy versioning here.