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Use NonDebuggable when parsing secrets

Contributions welcome — open a PR to refine or extend this article.

Description

SecretText transit (assignment between SecretText variables, parameters, and return values) is protected automatically. Extracting a secret from a Text source — for example, reading an access token out of a parsed JSON response — is a legitimate Text-to-SecretText conversion during which the plaintext exists. The [NonDebuggable] attribute prevents debuggers (regular and snapshot) from inspecting the procedure's locals, parameters, and return at that moment.

Best Practice

Apply [NonDebuggable] to any procedure that reads a response body, parses it, and assigns the extracted secret to a SecretText out-parameter or return. Keep the procedure narrow: it SHOULD do the minimum work required to obtain the SecretText, and nothing else.

See sample: use-nondebuggable-when-parsing-secrets.good.al.

Anti Pattern

Parsing a token response in a normal (debuggable) procedure. The plaintext token is visible in debug sessions and snapshots taken during the parse.

See sample: use-nondebuggable-when-parsing-secrets.bad.al.