Al: regions in AL

[RafaelKoch]

just a quick question: is there a way to use regions in AL? So something like

#region Write Log to File 
many many lines of code you would like to conveniently collapse
#endregion

[thpeder]

AL doesn't have support for regions at this moment.
We have a general issue with adding code folding to the Visual Studios Code extension because of lack of support: https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/issues/3422

[yrest]

@thpeder , Is it possible or are there any plans to make AL extension for VS Code available on "full visual studio" marketplace?

[StanislawStempin]

We do not have any plans to support full Visual Studio. Please see #932 for more details.

[anzwdev]

I've just manually added this section to al.configuration.json file in al extension folder:

"folding": {
        "markers": {
            "start": "^\\s*//\\s*#region\\b",
            "end": "^\\s*//\\s*#endregion\\b"
        }
    }

and I can use //#region and //#endregion in al files as in the attached picture now:

Could you include this modification in AL extension?

[anzwdev]

I've also modified alsyntax.tmlanguage file to get better region colors by adding this based on c# language definition part:

        <dict>
            <key>begin</key>
            <string>(^\s*)?(?=//\s*#region\b)</string>
            <key>beginCaptures</key>
            <dict>
                <key>1</key>
                <dict>
                    <key>name</key>
                    <string>keyword.preprocessor.region.al</string>
                </dict>
            </dict>
            <key>end</key>
            <string>(?!\G)</string>
            <key>patterns</key>
            <array>
                <dict>
                    <key>begin</key>
                    <string>//\s*#region</string>
                    <key>beginCaptures</key>
                    <dict>
                        <key>0</key>
                        <dict>
                            <key>name</key>
                            <string>keyword.preprocessor.region.al</string>
                        </dict>
                    </dict>
                    <key>end</key>
                    <string>\n</string>
                    <key>name</key>
                    <string>string.unquoted.preprocessor.message.al</string>
                </dict>
            </array>
        </dict>

        <dict>
            <key>match</key>
            <string>^\s*//\s*#endregion\b</string>
            <key>name</key>
            <string>keyword.preprocessor.region.al</string>
        </dict>

and it looks much better now:

[Gallimathias]

It would be even nicer if the two of them // would fall away and only # should be use.
A region is not a comment. In addition, a different color than blue would be good e. g. grey as it is not a command statement.

[thpeder]

Thanks the both of you for your suggestions. It is on our backlog but we are discussion internally how we want this to look.

[anzwdev]

I am trying to find a solution that won't require any changes to AL compiler and //#region and //#endregion tags seem to be better as they are already used for regions definition in javascript files in Visual Studio Code:

You can see that they have been defined by VS Code team at the end of this file:
https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/blob/master/extensions/javascript/javascript-language-configuration.json

I agree with you, it might be good to use different color for region/endregion tags but in my example I was again trying to use something that has already been defined by VS Code team and I've decided to copy color settings from C# language definition from this file:
https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/blob/master/extensions/csharp/syntaxes/csharp.tmLanguage.json

As you can see, VS Code team decided to use:

• keyword.preprocessor.region.cs for "region" tag
• keyword.preprocessor.endregion.cs for "endregion" tag
• string.unquoted.preprocessor.message.cs for region description text
  so we could use keyword.preprocessor.region.al, keyword.preprocessor.endregion.al and string.unquoted.preprocessor.message.al

And that's how VS Code shows region for C# files:

[anzwdev]

Thank you @thpeder

[jimmymcp]

My two cents to add to this thread,

I use the options to collapse and expand some/all functions in the dev environment all the time. I'd love to be able to do the same thing in VS Code - and preferably without having to define regions for each function - but I'm open to how you think to best implement this sort of thing.

[BartPermentier]

I got tired of manually adding the example code of anzwdev to AL every update so I created an extension that does it automatically.
https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=BartPermentier.al-toolbox

[NKarolak]

The regions directive has been released with BC 17
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/business-central/dev-itpro/developer/directives/devenv-directive-region

[RafaelKoch]

Oh splendid :-) Thanks @NKarolak for pointing this out here. I will close this evergreen feature request then :-)

I also love the code example...