[Xbrlapi-developer] XBRLAPI: Adding Dimensions to an Aspect Model

[Matthew D. <ro...@gm...>]

Hi Geoff,

I have been looking into Fact Sets and Aspect Values as a way of organizing
XBRL Facts along Dimensions.  However, I am having some trouble accessing
the custom dimensions that are provided in a filing's Contexts.  For
example, Agilent's 2011
10-K<http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1090872/000104746911010124/a-20111031.xml>has
many dimensions, such as "us-gaap:StatementEquityComponentsAxis".
However, when I build an Aspect Model and populate a Fact Set, there are no
Aspect Values for this Dimension.  The only Aspect Values I can find are
the defaults (Location, Period, Concept, etc.).  I drilled down to the
source code for building the Aspect Model, and it appears that the code
attempts to find additional Dimensions by calling
"getStore().<ExplicitDimension>getXMLResources(ExplicitDimensionImpl.class)".
If I run this myself in my code, sure enough, I get an empty set.

How can I access these extra Dimensions?  I am able to get the Member
values directly from each Contexts by calling getSegment() on the Entity.
However, that is rather clunky, and I haven't yet figured out how to get
the corresponding Axis, so it actually isn't too helpful.  Ideally, I would
be able to see all Dimensions and query only the Facts for a particular
Dimension; from your Run example, I feel like this should be quite doable.

Can you give me a hint about how I should be going about this?  I've been
banging away at it for a while.


Regards,
Matt DeAngelis