Agentic Coding ⚡ Direct Coding

Spec-driven, TDD-orchestrated AI development for Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, powered by GitHub Copilot agent mode.

Stop generating AL code ad-hoc. AC⚡DC gives GitHub Copilot a full team of specialized agents, pre-loaded coding standards, and structured workflows, so every feature starts from a spec, follows TDD, and passes a review gate before it lands.

No files are copied into your workspace. Install once, works everywhere.

Requirements

• VS Code 1.101 or higher (1.136+ for the per-agent reasoning effort override)
• GitHub Copilot (with agent mode enabled)
• AL Language extension (ms-dynamics-smb.al), for Business Central development

Quick Start

1. Install the extension from the Marketplace.
2. Open your AL project in VS Code.
3. Open the chat panel and switch to Agent mode.
4. Pick an agent from the AC⚡DC sidebar (or press Ctrl+Shift+P → AC/DC: Use Agent).
5. Describe your requirement, the agent guides you from spec to working code.

What You Get

Everything is delivered automatically through the extension, no .github/ setup, no file copies.

8 specialized customizable agents, each a named persona with a distinct role:

Auto-applied coding standards, instructions that activate automatically based on the file you edit (table, codeunit, page, test, query). No manual setup.

Composable skills, domain knowledge modules (API, events, performance, testing, permissions, pages, debug, and more) loaded on demand by the agents.

#acdcCodingStandard tool, agents can look up your company's AL coding standard mid-conversation. Also invokable directly in chat: #acdcCodingStandard.

Agent Settings panel

Select an agent in the Agents sidebar to open the Agent Settings panel, where you can override, per agent:

• The language model

  

• The reasoning effort: low, medium, high, xhigh or max. Requires VS Code 1.136+ and only takes effect on the agent-host path; older hosts ignore it.

  

• The tools: a grouped picker over every tool registered in the window. Tools are listed under their owner — the contributing extension (AL Language), the MCP server from your mcp.json (al-symbols-mcp), or the built-in toolset (read, edit, …). Use the chevron to expand a group and pick individual tools, or check the group itself to grant all of it, now and in the future: a checked group is stored as its wildcard (ms-dynamics-smb.al/*, or the bare toolset name for a built-in one), not as a snapshot of today's tools. Groups the agent already picks tools from open expanded; everything else starts collapsed.

  Choices are stored as deltas (disabledTools + extraTools) rather than a frozen list, so tools added in a future release still reach an agent you already overrode. Tool ids are stored qualified (ms-dynamics-smb.al/al_build, read/readFile) — the form VS Code expects in tools: frontmatter; ids stored bare by earlier versions are rewritten once, silently, at User scope. A tool whose owner is no longer installed is listed under Unavailable, stays checked, and is only removed if you uncheck it.

  Granting a write-capable tool (edit, execute, runCommands, runInTerminal, runTasks) to an agent that does not declare one raises a non-blocking warning — including when the grant is made by checking a whole group.

  

• The argument hint

  

• The review specialist

  

• The handoffs: Each handoff row includes an optional Handoff Prompt that is sent when that handoff is taken.

  

Edits are staged locally and are not applied automatically. The Apply button enables only once you change a setting; clicking it writes the overrides and reloads the window so chat picks them up. The panel warns you before the reload. Overrides are stored in acdc.agents.settings and are scoped per agent, so an override configured on one agent never leaks into another.

When an agent is selected in side panel, the customizable settings are shown in the panel below.

AL Base Code / ISV Code

Agents answer better when they can read the real AL source instead of recalling it. AC⚡DC clones read-only AL repositories, the Microsoft BC base app and any ISV product you have access to, and exposes them to the agents. Nothing is ever written back: the clones are mirrors that a sync overwrites.

Run AC/DC: Manage AL Base Code / ISV Code to open the table editor, then AC/DC: Sync AL Base Code / ISV Code to clone or pull the enabled rows.

1. One clone cache per machine

Sources are cloned under acdc.alBaseCode.sourcesRoot, resolved as <sourcesRoot>/<repo>/<branch> (default: %LOCALAPPDATA%\acdc-sources). Several projects therefore share one cache while each keeps its own branch or localization.

The setting is machine-scoped, VS Code only accepts it in User settings, so a developer-specific path can never land in a shared .code-workspace file. Only repository, branch and enabled are per-workspace.

2. Two access modes

acdc.alBaseCode.accessMode decides how the clones reach the agents. Only one mode is active per workspace; switching asks for confirmation and migrates immediately.

3. Searchable or portable

In workspace mode each source carries a Searchable toggle, off by default:

One line to remember: searchable buys you grep, portability buys you a committable workspace file. Turn it on for small ISV sources that are worth grepping, leave it off for the huge BC base app. Toggling remounts in place, nothing is re-cloned, and searchable folders are kept out of Source Control automatically.

Bring Your Own Rules, BCQuality Custom Layers

On top of Microsoft's bundled BCQuality knowledge, you can attach private BCQuality forks, "custom layers", that carry your customer's or partner's house rules (naming conventions, prefix policies, security checks, etc.). Layers are pulled from git into the extension's per-user globalStorage; nothing is written into your AL workspace.

1. Add a layer

Run AC/DC: Manage BCQuality Custom Layers to open the table editor. Each row is one fork:

Save & Sync runs the same interactive install as AC/DC: Sync BCQuality Custom Layers.

2. Fork layout

Only files under custom/ are imported (the fork's Microsoft mirror is ignored):

custom/
  knowledge/**/*.md      -> Copilot rules  (<layer-id>__*.instructions.md)
  skills/<name>.md       -> action skill   (<layer-id>__<name>/SKILL.md)
  skills/<name>/SKILL.md -> folder skill   (agentskills.io layout)

All names are prefixed with <layer-id>__ so a custom layer can never shadow a bundled Microsoft/community namespace.

3. Where to find the imported content

• Rules show up automatically in the VS Code Copilot Chat instructions picker, the extension registers the layer's instructions/ folder with chat.instructionsFilesLocations.

• Skills are NOT in the chat Skills picker (that surface is a static package.json manifest and has no runtime-registration API). Instead, review/audit agents (@Bon, AL Auditor, @Wrench, AL Triage, the AL Code Review Subagent) consult them automatically via four language-model tools:

  Tool	Purpose
  #acdc_list_bcquality_custom_rules	List every imported rule
  #acdc_get_bcquality_custom_rule	Read a rule by qualified name
  #acdc_list_bcquality_custom_skills	List every imported skill
  #acdc_get_bcquality_custom_skill	Read a skill by qualified name

  You can invoke them yourself in chat, e.g. #acdc_list_bcquality_custom_skills prints a Name / Layer / Description table.

4. Priority on conflict

custom > community > microsoft. A finding raised by a custom-layer skill outranks the bundled equivalents.

See assets/help/settings-help.md for the full setting reference.

Routing Guide

Not sure which agent to start with? Use this table:

Not sure?

• Select the Architect agent in you chat agent dropdown or in the sidepanel
• add the requirement / issue file to the chat context
• Start you question:

I need to implement or fix this...

The agent will assess the complexity and recommend the right workflow.

TDD Orchestration with Malcolm

When you route through @Malcolm, AL Conductor, each feature goes through a structured cycle:

1. Plan, research context, define phases
2. RED, write failing tests first
3. GREEN, minimal code to pass tests
4. REFACTOR, apply AL patterns and standards
5. Review gate, code review subagent validates against spec
6. Your approval, human-in-the-loop before moving to the next phase

Commands

All commands are under the AC/DC category (Ctrl+Shift+P → type AC/DC).

Settings

Updates are delivered automatically through the VS Code Marketplace, no manual configuration needed. After an update AC⚡DC tells you what landed: a notification with What's New / README / Don't show again, plus the changelog preview on a major or minor bump. Tune or silence it with acdc.showReleaseNotesOnUpdate.

Source & Weekly Sync

The agents, skills, and coding standards bundled in this extension are sourced from the ALDC, AL Development Collection community framework and the microsoft/BCQuality knowledge base.

Both sources are synced automatically on a weekly schedule. Updates land in the next extension release, no manual steps needed on your end.

License

MIT, See LICENSE for details.