* Add runmodal-is-not-allowed-inside-write-transactions.md; drop "modal page" from the prompts article
A modal page does not behave like Confirm/StrMenu inside a write
transaction: the platform refuses Page.RunModal (and Report/XmlPort
.RunModal with a request page, and Codeunit.Run with its return value
used) with a runtime error instead of holding the lock. The new article
documents that guard - verified against Microsoft Learn (Codeunit.Run
transaction semantics), microsoft/AL#5452, Microsoft's own Base
Application (Commit(); Page.RunModal pattern), and a live reproduction
on Business Central 26 quoted verbatim. avoid-user-prompts-inside-
transactions.md keeps its scope to the prompts the platform does allow;
"modal page" is removed from its list because that case is refused, not
stalled.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
* Do not list Message among the lock-holding prompts
Message runs asynchronously - it is queued and shown when the calling
method ends or another method requests input - so it never pauses the
transaction and holds no lock. Only Confirm and StrMenu wait for the
user.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
* State the four write-transaction conditions as one explicit line per method
Mirrors the structure of the platform's own error message so the
Report.RunModal and XmlPort.RunModal request-page exceptions are
visible at a glance instead of buried in prose.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
* Title the article after the platform error it explains
"AL methods limited during write transactions: commit before RunModal
and Codeunit.Run" - so a developer or agent searching for the runtime
error text lands on the one article that covers all four restricted
methods. Slug and sample stems renamed to match; keywords gain the
error's own phrase and the legacy Form.RunModal name it still uses.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
* Trim keywords to 10 per validator guidance
* Wire the new article into al-performance-review.md
Adds Page.RunModal / Report.RunModal / XmlPort.RunModal / UseRequestPage
to the extracted-token list and one deterministic worklist cue with
exclusions, so the article is selected from the RunModal call itself
rather than only via a co-located Commit/Modify token. Codeunit.Run in
that position is routed to its existing owner article.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
* Correct XmlPort.RunModal to Xmlport.Run; fix READ-convention sample links
XmlPort has no RunModal method (static or instance) - Microsoft Learn
confirms only Xmlport.Run(Integer [, Boolean RequestWindow] [, Boolean]
[, var Record]). Replaces the invented API with the real one throughout
the article, worklist cue, and token list, and explains the platform
error message's own "XmlPort.RunModal" wording as the same kind of
legacy phrasing already noted for Form.RunModal/RequestForm.
Also corrects UseRequestPage(false): that's a Report instance method
only, not applicable to XMLport, which uses the UseRequestPage = false
object property or Run's RequestWindow argument instead.
Fixes the two sample references to use the READ-convention markdown
link form (Test-KnowledgeIndex.ps1's Knowledge-Retrieval.ps1 check was
failing on plain backtick text).
Rebased onto upstream/main to resolve conflicts with #148's job-queue
additions to al-performance-review.md - both sets of worklist tokens
and cues are retained.
* Add Report.Run alongside Report.RunModal to the write-transaction guard routing
al-performance-review.md's tokens/cues only recognized Report.RunModal,
so a failing Modify(); Report.Run(..., true, ...) path was never
worklisted even though Report.Run shares the exact same RequestWindow-
blocking-dialog mechanism as Report.RunModal (they differ only in
whether the report instance is cleared afterward). Added Report.Run to
the token list and the targeted cue, with the same request-page-
suppressed exclusion, and extended the knowledge article's Description
bullet to name both methods explicitly instead of only RunModal.
---------
Co-authored-by: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Co-authored-by: Jesper Schulz-Wedde <jesper.schulzwedde@microsoft.com>
Co-authored-by: Copilot App <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
* Add 18 community AL/BC patterns across style, data-modeling, web-services, appsource, breaking-changes, performance, and testing
Contributed by CURABIS ApS, generalized from patterns observed across real AppSource/PTE development. Each article follows the knowledge file format (frontmatter, Description/Best Practice/Anti Pattern, sibling .good.al/.bad.al samples).
* Address Jesper Schulz-Wedde's review on PR #156
- Rename 3 articles so their .good.al/.bad.al companion stems match
(do-not-change-primary-key, testfield-required-setup-field,
al-identifiers-english), fixing the R14 orphan-sample errors.
- do-not-change-primary-key.good.al: include Flow in the new table's
own primary key so it actually models the discriminating dimension.
- al-build-output-must-not-pollute-project-root.md: drop the
unsubstantiated AL0197 causal claim and the non-existent
al.outputPath setting; reframe as build-artifact hygiene sourced
from ALTool --outfolder / al_build outputPath.
- prefer-email-module.md: Email Message is Codeunit 8904, not a table;
distinguish it from the underlying Sent/Outbox/Draft storage.
- file-datatype-saas.md: File.Open/Create/Read/Write fails to compile
against a Cloud-scoped project, it does not compile and silently
fail at runtime.
- namespace-must-be-verified-from-source.md: narrow to "resolve from
the referenced object's source or symbols," since source-file line
one is not the only authoritative source (symbol packages, comments
before the namespace line).
- test-data-must-be-random-and-complete.md: drop "assume an empty
database" and "collision-free" absolutes; reframe around
independence from unrelated business records and reserving explicit
values for scenario-defining inputs.
- binary-choice-must-be-boolean.md: scope to genuine true/false
semantics, not mechanical two-member-enum-to-boolean conversion.
- document-report-word-layout.md: scope down to a sourced Microsoft
Learn recommendation instead of an unconditional performance
guarantee; cite the three Learn pages.
- Wire the new articles into their review skills' candidate-selection
signals (file-datatype-saas, prefer-email-module,
namespace-must-be-verified-from-source, var-parameters-require-an-
addressable-variable) so they can actually enter a worklist.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
* Fix dimension-management-wiring.md: ValidateShortcutDimCode and CreateDim
do not exist on the current DimensionManagement codeunit
Verified against microsoft/BCApps: the real master-table validation
procedure is ValidateDimValueCode (or ValidateShortcutDimValues when a
DimSetID is also needed), and the real document-side inheritance
procedure is GetDefaultDimID, not CreateDim. Caught from Jesper
Schulz-Wedde's review thread, which had been partially hidden by
GitHub's comment folding.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
* Address second round of Jesper Schulz-Wedde's review on PR #156
- dimension-management-wiring.md/.good.al: split into the two distinct
models the article was conflating - master data (Default Dimension
records via ValidateDimValueCode/SaveDefaultDim) vs. transactional/
document data (a single Dimension Set ID assembled via AddDimSource +
GetDefaultDimID, verified against BCApps' ExchRateAdjmtProcess.Codeunit.al).
Added a compiling document-table example alongside the existing master
table one.
- Deleted api-page-flowfields-must-be-calcfields (.md/.good.al/.bad.al):
Microsoft's own FlowFields documentation states a FlowField used as a
control's direct source expression is automatically calculated on any
page - no API-page exception is documented, and none could be
reproduced.
- prefer-email-module.bad.al/.md: Codeunit Mail has no Send/GetErrorDesc
members; fixed to the real current 7-argument CreateMessage signature,
and corrected the claim that the legacy path "still runs" - its base
implementation no longer sends anything, only raises integration events.
- check-post-line-batch-pattern.md/.good.al: reframed from a universal
invariant to the standard shape, naming the real Gen./Item/CA/Res./Job/
Insurance/Mfg. Item/FA Jnl.-Check Line/-Post Line/-Post Batch codeunits
it's based on. Added the missing Check Line companion codeunit so the
good fixture is internally complete.
- test-data-must-be-random-and-complete.good.al: removed leftover
"collision-free" wording contradicting the already-corrected article text.
- fixed-choice-set-must-use-enum-not-integer.md: removed the reintroduced
state-count heuristic ("the line is the state count"), aligned with
binary-choice-must-be-boolean.md's semantics-based distinction.
- namespace-must-be-verified-from-source.md: removed the false claim that
the compiler and AL Language Server use different namespace-resolution
rules.
- intrinsic-al-functions-must-use-modern-casing.md: removed the unverified
claim that PascalCase is the VS Code formatter's default output.
Worklist completeness: added cues for the 8 rules in data-modeling,
testing, performance, and web-services that had none (Jesper's explicit
ask), plus the same gap in all 7 style rules from this PR (not explicitly
named this round, but the identical systemic issue) - 15 cues total across
al-data-modeling-review.md, al-testing-review.md, al-performance-review.md,
al-web-services-review.md, and al-style-review.md.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
* Fix remaining correctness issues from Jesper's 2026-09-15 re-review
- dimension-management-wiring: SaveDefaultDim's third argument is the
shortcut dimension number (1-8), not the field's AL field ID; the
fixture passed FieldNo(...) = 10. GetDefaultDimID's InheritFromDimSetID
must be 0 when recomputing after the linking record changes, not the
document's existing Dimension Set ID (which would retain the previous
customer's leftover dimensions). Verified against
DimensionManagement.Codeunit.al and BankDepositHeader.Table.al in the
BCApps reference clone.
- check-post-line-batch-pattern: "Post Line writes exactly one line to
the ledger" overclaimed - Gen. Jnl.-Post Line alone calls InsertGLEntry
from a dozen call sites (balancing entry, VAT, currency rounding,
deferrals) and can write several G/L Entries per journal line.
Reworded to "posts exactly one journal line" and softened the
"distinct, non-overlapping responsibilities" absolute.
- namespace-must-be-verified-from-source.bad.al: dropped the "resolves
in a local build, fails in VS Code" comment (taught an inherent
compiler/language-server disagreement that isn't real); reframed as
stale/cached symbols, matching the prose fix already made.
- file-datatype-saas.good.al: replaced the deprecated 5-argument
UploadIntoStream overload with the current 2-argument one, and
actually staged through TempBlob as the article's own Best Practice
instructs (the declared TempBlob variable was previously unused).
- test-data-must-be-random-and-complete: no longer treats a
short-but-valid value as defective merely for being "underfilled" -
AL field lengths are maxima, not minimums. Scoped to missing values
or a scenario with an explicit length/format requirement (e.g. a
truncation test). Updated the al-testing-review.md routing cue to
match.
- stored-derived-fields-must-not-be-exposed-directly: stopped mandating
source-field exposure as part of the core pattern: the good fixture
exposed only one of the derived value's two inputs (Hours Used, not
Budgeted Hours), making the claimed "so the consumer can verify it"
impossible. Reframed as an optional, all-or-nothing addition and
fixed the fixture to expose both inputs.
Rebased onto upstream/main to resolve conflicts in
al-breaking-changes-review.md, al-data-modeling-review.md,
al-performance-review.md, and al-style-review.md against merged PRs
#148 and #153; all sides' worklist tokens/cues retained.
* Fix remaining READ-convention sample links across this PR's 18 articles
The same plain-backtick "See sample: \`x.good.al\`." form fixed on
al-methods-limited-during-write-transactions (PR #161) turned up
repo-wide on 15 more of this PR's articles - Knowledge-Retrieval.ps1
requires the markdown-link form to associate a sample with its
article. All 16 fixed; the four local validators (frontmatter,
knowledge-index, knowledge-retrieval, review-fixtures, skill-index)
pass.
* Fix two merge-critical correctness issues from Jesper's 2026-09-22 review
- api-page-key-fields-must-be-editable-on-insert.good.al and
stored-derived-fields-must-not-be-exposed-directly.good.al: both were
writable API pages missing DelayedInsert = true, contradicting this
repo's own api-page-delayedinsert-true rule - the canonical "good"
samples were teaching code BCQuality itself flags.
- dimension-management-wiring.good.al: UpdateDimensionSetID exited
early when Customer.Get failed, leaving the previous customer's
shortcut dimension and Dimension Set ID in place - the same staleness
bug the InheritFromDimSetID = 0 fix (from the prior review round) was
meant to prevent, just triggered by a failed lookup instead of a
successful one. Now clears the shortcut field and recomputes with an
empty source list on a failed lookup too, so GetDefaultDimID
correctly returns an empty Dimension Set ID instead of never running.
---------
Co-authored-by: Claude Sonnet 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Use the required READ-convention Markdown links so knowledge retrieval can associate all new samples with their articles.
Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Co-authored-by: dayland <dayland@microsoft.com>
Copilot-Session: 76eb42c4-2acd-4f9c-a898-f4a44f9d46f7
Move canonical knowledge for Microsoft-owned review domains into the Microsoft layer and document the skill/knowledge co-location policy.
Co-authored-by: Copilot App <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Co-authored-by: Jesper Schulz-Wedde <jesper.schulzwedde@microsoft.com>
Copilot-Session: 2a6ea875-d38e-4f30-aadb-0d606f9be231
* knowledge(performance): align SetLoadFields placement with AL Guidelines (#120)
The AL Guidelines mark `SetLoadFields` placed before `SetRange`/`SetFilter`
as bad code and recommend filters first, while the BCQuality samples used
the opposite order — contradictory guidance across two Microsoft repos.
Per Learn (`Record.SetLoadFields`), "fields that are filtered upon are
always loaded", so the two orders produce an identical projection. The
upstream rule is a readability convention: keep `SetLoadFields` adjacent
to the read it governs.
- Reorder filters ahead of `SetLoadFields` in the six affected AL samples.
- State the placement convention in the Best Practice section.
- Record in Description that order does not change the projection, and
that only a fieldless `SetLoadFields()` or a later overwriting call does.
- Add an Anti Pattern note so review agents treat the reverse order as a
readability observation, never a performance defect.
Co-authored-by: Copilot App <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
* Clarify partial-record projection changes
Document AddLoadFields, SetBaseLoadFields, and Reset alongside SetLoadFields so the statement-order guidance does not imply those APIs leave the projection unchanged.
Co-authored-by: Copilot App <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Copilot-Session: 89dba8c8-6529-4b60-956f-875a59be499d
---------
Co-authored-by: Jesper Schulz-Wedde <jesper.schulzwedde@microsoft.com>
Co-authored-by: Copilot App <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Copilot-Session: 89dba8c8-6529-4b60-956f-875a59be499d
- upgrade/obsoletereason-need-not-restate-removal-version: ObsoleteTag carries the version; do not flag ObsoleteReason for omitting it (PR 8290)
- error-handling/unchecked-get-throws-when-record-not-found: a bare Rec.Get() errors on missing record; it is not silently ignored (PR 8584)
- performance/onaftergetcurrrecord-is-not-per-row: OnAfterGetCurrRecord fires on selection change, not per row; CalcFields there is not N+1 (PR 8617)
* Add precision guards for systematic agent false-positive patterns
Encodes reviewer-confirmed FP guards from the online eval: tooltip-inherited, page-trigger default return, drill-down filter not visible in diff, dual-trigger CalcFields (do.md); and a released-baseline precondition for breaking-change/upgrade findings on never-shipped symbols.
* Scope suggested-code and location to exactly the changed lines
Addresses reviewer-reported misplaced suggestions from the eval: insert-only-property emitting the whole field, single-statement rewrites anchored on the procedure name, and reductive multi-line collapses. The skill now emits a location range that matches precisely the rewritten lines.
* Correct suggested-code scoping guidance to match one-click anchor mechanics
A lone inserted line matches no existing file line and cannot be anchored; bracket the new line with one adjacent unchanged line instead. Reductive collapses omit suggested-code and fall back to a manual snippet.
* Move BC-specific FP guards out of do.md into leaf skills
do.md is the stable action-skill template and must stay domain-agnostic (JesperSchulz review). Relocate the four known false-positive patterns to their domain leaves: ToolTip-inheritance to al-ui-review; drill-down/lookup filtering and CalcFields lifecycle to al-performance-review; page-trigger exit(true) semantics to al-error-handling-review.
* Move suggested-code line-scoping guidance out of do.md into al-code-review
do.md must not carry instructions for how the review skill behaves (JesperSchulz review). Relocate the location/suggested-code precise-span rules to al-code-review's existing Suggested-code guidance section. do.md is now unchanged vs main.
* Move false-positive guards from skills into knowledge files
Keep review skills slim (finders/appliers). The FP guards and released-baseline preconditions previously embedded in leaf skills become negative-clarification knowledge articles in their domains, and the agent-findings policy edits to al-ui/al-privacy are reverted to main. Adds 6 knowledge files: error-handling (page-boolean-triggers-default-to-true), ui (bound-page-field-inherits-source-field-tooltip), performance (calcfields-in-both-getrecord-triggers-is-not-redundant, page-effective-filter-may-live-outside-the-diff), breaking-changes (unreleased-symbol-change-is-not-a-breaking-change), upgrade (unreleased-schema-change-needs-no-upgrade-path).
* Revert branch's suggested-code scoping addition in al-code-review
The three location-span shapes added to al-code-review are output-format mechanics, not domain knowledge: one-click span correctness is the engine's job (Resolve-SuggestionPlacement) and do.md already owns the suggested-code/location contract. The AL concerns the examples illustrate are already covered by existing knowledge (use-isempty-for-existence-check, data-classification-required-on-pii-fields, no-space-before-method-parenthesis). Restores al-code-review to main; the branch now adds only the 6 knowledge files.
* Restore al-ui/al-privacy review skills to base (zero diff in PR)
These two leaf skills carried an accidental net change against the PR merge-base because an earlier revert used the current origin/main (post-#110) instead of the branch base (pre-#110). Restoring them to the merge-base version removes them from the PR diff entirely. Three-way merge still preserves main's #110 suppression.
---------
Co-authored-by: wenjiefan <wenjiefan@microsoft.com>
* Complete AL review knowledge readiness
Fill telemetry and Query coverage, strengthen thin review domains, correct audited content defects, and add deterministic cheap-model evaluation and reference-integrity safeguards.
Co-authored-by: Copilot App <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Copilot-Session: 9825b012-e653-496a-9310-c1f4b6f8ac27
* Generalize review fixture discovery
Derive smoke cases from the leaf, domain, and paired-sample conventions so new leaves require no scoring-contract changes. Keep only exceptional selection/context overrides and fail when retrieval metadata cannot rank the selected article.
Co-authored-by: Copilot App <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Copilot-Session: 9825b012-e653-496a-9310-c1f4b6f8ac27
* Preserve published field IDs in sample
Keep the existing Email and Contact Email field IDs unchanged, clarify that the sample represents an independent baseline, and use a local breaking-change rule for the generic smoke evaluation.
Co-authored-by: Copilot App <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Copilot-Session: 9825b012-e653-496a-9310-c1f4b6f8ac27
* Clarify published field identity rules
State explicitly that a published field keeps its ID, name, and type while a replacement is added as a separate field under an unused ID.
Co-authored-by: Copilot App <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Copilot-Session: 9825b012-e653-496a-9310-c1f4b6f8ac27
* Align field obsoletion sample baselines
Use Email field ID 3 as the shared baseline so the bad example demonstrates a same-ID rename while the good example retains the original field and adds a separate replacement.
Co-authored-by: Copilot App <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Copilot-Session: 9825b012-e653-496a-9310-c1f4b6f8ac27
---------
Co-authored-by: Jesper Schulz-Wedde <jesper.schulzwedde@microsoft.com>
Pure git-mv relocation of all 7 performance articles from community/knowledge/performance/ to microsoft/knowledge/performance/. No content changes.
Co-authored-by: Jesper Schulz-Wedde <jesper.schulzwedde@microsoft.com>
Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
The previous LLM-generated knowledge files contained factual
hallucinations. The most visible was the claim that `FindFirst` /
`FindLast` "forces a full-table scan" on an unfiltered record - it does
not; those APIs return a single row via the current key.
Other inaccuracies the audit found and fixed:
* `FindSet(true)` was described as "taking a LockTable". The correct
upstream phrasing is that `FindSet(true)` sets
`ReadIsolation::UpdLock` on the read. UpdLock and LockTable are
related but distinct mechanisms.
* The list of production-scale tables had been invented beyond the
upstream source (e.g. "Detailed Cust. Ledg. Entry") without a
citation. The regenerated list matches the ten tables upstream lists
with their P95 row counts.
* `SetLoadFields` guidance had been augmented with an extra mechanism
claim ("the database resolves the filter using the index without
hydrating the value") not present in upstream.
Approach: full regeneration of `microsoft/knowledge/` from the six
upstream BCApps Code Review instruction files, with Microsoft Learn /
the AL language reference as a secondary source. Every claim in every
regenerated file is anchored to a verbatim upstream quote (or a Learn
URL); the audit trail lives in artifacts/trace-<domain>.json on the
session workspace.
The PR #11 transaction/error-handling cluster is preserved verbatim:
* performance/understand-implicit-transaction-boundary.md
* performance/codeunit-run-as-atomic-sub-operation.{md,good.al,bad.al}
* performance/codeunit-run-requires-prior-commit-inside-transaction.{md,good.al,bad.al}
* performance/use-tryfunction-for-error-catching-not-rollback.{md,good.al,bad.al}
* performance/avoid-commit-inside-loops.{md,good.al,bad.al}
* security/commitbehavior-attribute-scopes-explicit-commits.{md,good.al,bad.al}
* testing/transactionmodel-attribute-governs-test-transactions.{md,good.al,bad.al}
These articles already cite Microsoft Learn and were carefully
cross-referenced; the regeneration skips their topics rather than
duplicating them.
File counts after regeneration:
performance 35 .md (5 preserved + 30 new)
privacy 17 .md
security 18 .md (1 preserved + 17 new)
style 33 .md
testing 1 .md (preserved)
ui 19 .md
upgrade 18 .md
Total 141 atomic knowledge files, each strictly one rule. All pass
.github/scripts/validate_frontmatter.py with 0 errors and 0 warnings.
Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Cover non-obvious platform behaviors a capable LLM reliably gets wrong:
hidden FlowFields still calculate, LockTable scopes to the whole table,
query objects bypass the primary-key cache, table-event subscribers
disable bulk ModifyAll/DeleteAll, Blob fields are uncached, OnCompanyOpen
subscribers block every session creation, and the test framework
disables bulk insert mode.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
- performance/use-setloadfields-for-partial-records: Clarify that
filter-only fields (SetRange/SetFilter) do not need to be listed in
SetLoadFields — the DB resolves them via the index without hydrating
the value into AL memory.
- performance/avoid-calcfields-in-loops: Add explicit exception for
OnAfterGetRecord and OnValidate triggers, which are platform-managed
and not developer-authored loops.
- performance/split-read-only-and-write-paths-to-avoid-locktable: Add
ReadIsolation as the primary recommendation for read-only paths;
LockTable reserved for confirmed write paths only.
- performance/prefer-direct-record-over-recordref: Scope the finding to
hot unbounded loops (10k+ rows) over ledger-entry-scale tables;
RecordRef in bounded/admin/setup contexts is not a concern.
- upgrade/enum-changes-must-be-additive-at-the-end: Replace direct
ObsoleteState = Removed guidance with the two-stage workflow (Pending
first, Removed later); reference use-obsolete-pending-before-removed.
- upgrade/use-datatransfer-for-large-dataset-initialization: Add the
>300,000 records threshold as the concrete trigger for requiring
DataTransfer.
Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
The 35 articles still in their seed form previously carried a banner
reading "Seed article. ... Domain stewards should expand, restructure,
and refine as needed." For a community preview, that phrasing reads as
"TODO left in production" to first-time visitors.
Replace all three banner variants (performance-seeded, security-seeded,
community-ported) with a single positive invitation:
> Contributions welcome — open a PR to refine or extend this article.
Content and structure of the articles are unchanged; only the leading
quote block differs. Articles that had their banner fully stripped in
the earlier triage pass (the showcase-grade ten) are unaffected.
Adds 55 articles (plus 76 code samples) spanning four new domains and
two existing domains, extracted from the internal Business Central
review-agent prompt. Content was filtered against BCQuality's
remedial-knowledge premise: each article encodes BC-specific behaviour,
a CodeCop rule, a platform API semantic, or an anti-false-positive
guideline that a capable LLM would otherwise get wrong.
New domains:
- privacy (11 articles): DataClassification inheritance semantics, the
StrSubstNo-defeats-Error-telemetry-classification pitfall, Privacy
Notice consent for outgoing requests, anti-false-positives for pages
and in-memory data.
- upgrade (11 articles): upgrade-codeunit structure, upgrade-tag
lifecycle and registration, protected DB reads, DataTransfer for
large datasets, InitValue semantics, enum-ordinal preservation,
obsolete-workflow, first-install detection.
- ui (9 articles): caption capitalization by phrase type, tooltip voice,
teaching-tip vs tooltip, tour-tip conventions, character limits,
banned terms, ampersand handling, title punctuation.
- style (11 articles): label-suffix convention, API page naming,
temporary-variable prefix, label properties (Comment/Locked), named
invocations, FieldCaption in user messages, OptionCaption pairing,
Error-parameter passing, `this` keyword, required parentheses, file
naming.
Gaps in existing domains:
- performance (11 articles): production-scale table catalog (no row
counts, per internal-data concern), anti-false-positive for bounded
tables, guard-before-Get ordering, redundant-Get-in-OnAfterGetRecord,
LockTable in read-only helpers, combined ModifyAll passes, writes in
OnAfterGetRecord, SetLoadFields heuristics, temporary-table
regressions, FlowField source-table widening, MaintainSQLIndex
disabling SIFT.
- security (2 articles): environment-specific hardcoded GUIDs,
ValidateTableRelation=false on user input.
Intentionally excluded: specific production P95 row-count numbers
(aggregated internal telemetry); rewritten as categorical guidance on
which tables to treat as production-scale without publishing sizes.
All articles use `bc-version: [all]` (applies to every BC version, per
the new schema sentinel). Validator passes with 0 errors / 0 warnings.
Most of the corpus — FindSet/SetLoadFields/CalcFields patterns, permission
sets, SingleInstance codeunits, DataClassification, IsolatedStorage,
transaction scope, SecretText — describes BC platform behaviour that is
identical across supported versions. The seed [26..28] range on every
file implied a version-specificity the content does not actually have,
and there was no way to express "applies to every version" in the
schema the way [w1] and [all] already do for countries and
application-area.
Extend the v1 schema with a universal sentinel for bc-version, parallel
to the sentinels already defined for the other dimensions:
bc-version: [all] # applies to every BC version
[all] is mutually exclusive with explicit versions. Range shorthand
([26..28]) and explicit lists ([26, 27, 28]) continue to work for files
genuinely tied to a version-gated API or deprecation.
Update read.md (field definition, matching semantics, partial-context
rule), write.md (default to [all], use ranges only with a concrete
reason), README.md (frontmatter example), and the CI validator. All
forty existing knowledge files and the three action skills convert to
[all]; none of the current content is version-gated. Validator passes.
Remove seven knowledge files whose content is generic software-engineering
guidance that a capable LLM already applies without BCQuality present
(HTTPS-only, secret-leakage-in-errors, no-credentials-in-URLs, silent
security-error swallowing, short transaction scope, HTTP timeouts,
StrSubstNo-vs-concatenation). These fail the remedial-knowledge premise
and dilute the signal of the preview corpus.
Strip the "Seed article — domain stewards should expand" banner from ten
files that are ready to showcase (AA0232/AA0233 rules, FindSet read-only
semantics, SetLoadFields ordering and usage, CalcFields-in-loops,
SecretText end-to-end, DataClassification). The banner remains on files
that still need domain-steward refinement.
Add a "What belongs here" section to the README stating the admission
test: a file exists only if a modern LLM would get something wrong or
miss something without it. Gives contributors a concrete yes/no filter
before they open a PR.
The /samples/ top-level tree is replaced with sibling files in each
knowledge-layer folder. An article and its demonstrations now live
side-by-side:
microsoft/knowledge/<domain>/<slug>.md
microsoft/knowledge/<domain>/<slug>.good.al
microsoft/knowledge/<domain>/<slug>.bad.al
Rationale:
- Proximity. An article and its paired samples are one unit; the
filesystem now reflects that.
- Layer ownership. Samples inherit layer precedence for free -- a
/custom/ fork can override an article and its samples atomically,
which the shared /samples/ tree previously made awkward.
- Trivial migration path. Action-skill source globs
(*/knowledge/<domain>/**/*.md) are unchanged; sample discovery is a
sibling-filename lookup.
Changes:
- git mv of all 65 sample files from samples/<domain>/<slug>/{bad,good}.al
to microsoft/knowledge/<domain>/<slug>.{bad,good}.al (history preserved).
- Update See-sample references in all 37 articles that ship samples.
- skills/read.md: replace the no-code-blocks bullet with a pointer to a
new Sample files section that fully specifies the sibling convention,
the kinds (good/bad + forward-compatible), multi-technology rules,
demonstration-only status, and layer-precedence behaviour.
- skills/write.md: update the samples pointer to match.
- README.md: annotate the knowledge tree with the sample sibling shape.
- samples/README.md deleted; content lifted into skills/read.md.
- Both generators (C:\temp\gen_performance_knowledge.py,
C:\temp\gen_security_knowledge.py) updated to emit at the new paths
and to stop writing samples/README.md. Re-running them is idempotent
against the committed layout.
Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
Converts an existing performance-review prompt into 22 atomic
knowledge articles under microsoft/knowledge/performance/, each
paired with AL samples under samples/performance/<slug>/ demonstrating
the anti-pattern and/or the best practice. The full set seeds the
corpus the microsoft/skills/al-performance-review leaf skill matches
against and validates the READ knowledge-file format end-to-end.
Every article conforms to the READ contract: six required frontmatter
fields, Description always present, no fenced code blocks, sample
code referenced by repo-relative path. Each article is marked with a
blockquote 'Seed article' note so domain stewards can extend or
restructure them freely.
Articles (ordered by concern area):
Database query efficiency
- use-findset-with-next (AA0181)
- avoid-findfirst-with-next (AA0233)
- only-fetch-records-you-use (AA0175)
- use-findset-readonly-by-default
- use-setloadfields-for-partial-records
- use-addloadfields-in-report-layouts
- use-calcsums-to-aggregate-filtered-sets (file: use-calcsums-for-flowfield-totals.md)
- avoid-calcfields-in-loops
- add-sift-keys-for-flowfields (AA0232)
- use-isempty-for-existence-checks
Filter and key optimization
- filter-before-find
- set-current-key-to-match-filters
Temporary tables and transactions
- use-temporary-tables-for-intermediate-data
- keep-transaction-scope-short
- avoid-user-interaction-in-transactions
- avoid-commit-inside-loops
Record operations
- prefer-get-for-primary-key-lookups
- use-insert-false-when-skipping-triggers
- prefer-direct-record-over-recordref
Strings, codeunits, events
- use-strsubstno-for-message-formatting
- use-single-instance-codeunits-for-caching
- keep-event-subscribers-lightweight
samples/README.md documents the sample-folder convention and makes
clear the samples are demonstration-only, not derived from BC base
application source, with unique object IDs in the 50100-50199 range.
Rubber-duck pass caught: a misleading good.al in avoid-calcfields-in-loops
(fixed by switching to a hoistable CalcFields scenario), an invalid
event subscriber signature in keep-event-subscribers-lightweight
(fixed by adding var xRec), normative guidance leaked into the
Description of use-findset-readonly-by-default (moved to Anti Pattern),
a missing sample pair for keep-transaction-scope-short (added), and
muddy FlowField/CalcSums framing (retitled and clarified).
Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>
