Documented parameters allowed values

[Scot-Bernard]

I've found while authoring templates, that documentation on parameters sometimes shows an example value, but not the enumeration of the other possible ones, or a link to its definition.

For example, the documentation for timeZoneId in the resource "Microsoft.DevTestLab/schedules" shows one possible value, but if I want to specify a different one, I don't know where to find it.

Neither going to the portal and listing the possible values listed to select would help, as they are persisted with another name if I look them after created in the resource explorer. If I choose "(UTC-03:00) City of Buenos Aires", on resource explorer I find the property set as "Argentina Standard Time".

So, bringing this information in the documentation will be very useful.

For this I ended up in a stack overflow response of someone who listed the time zones from the windows registry, and it worked, but it was a lucky shoot, and I would like to be sure of the values I'm setting, and also where they come from.

[brwilkinson]

Hi @Scot-Bernard

At the moment, those docs are auto generated based on what is in the API specification.

timeZoneId	The time zone ID (e.g. Pacific Standard time).	string

We have the specifications also published here:

• https://github.com/Azure/azure-rest-api-specs

E.g.

• https://github.com/Azure/azure-rest-api-specs/blob/main/specification/devtestlabs/resource-manager/Microsoft.DevTestLab/stable/2018-09-15/DTL.json#L11705-L11708

        "timeZoneId": {
          "description": "The time zone ID (e.g. Pacific Standard time).",
          "type": "string"
        }

These are owned and controlled by the Owner of the Resource Provider e.g. Microsoft.DevTestLab team.

---

Compare this description to the description on the Microsoft.Compute/VirtualMachineScaleset

https://github.com/Azure/azure-rest-api-specs/blob/main/specification/compute/resource-manager/Microsoft.Compute/ComputeRP/stable/2022-11-01/computeRPCommon.json#LL1266C1-L1269C11

        "timeZone": {
          "type": "string",
          "description": "Specifies the time zone of the virtual machine. e.g. \"Pacific Standard Time\". <br><br> Possible values can be [TimeZoneInfo.Id](https://docs.microsoft.com/dotnet/api/system.timezoneinfo.id?#System_TimeZoneInfo_Id) value from time zones returned by [TimeZoneInfo.GetSystemTimeZones](https://docs.microsoft.com/dotnet/api/system.timezoneinfo.getsystemtimezones)."
        },

which ends up as following in the docs page

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/templates/microsoft.compute/2020-12-01/virtualmachinescalesets/virtualmachines?pivots=deployment-language-bicep#windowsconfiguration

timeZone	Specifies the time zone of the virtual machine. e.g. "Pacific Standard Time". Possible values can be TimeZoneInfo.Id value from time zones returned by TimeZoneInfo.GetSystemTimeZones	string

I think the best action might be, if you could open the issue directly on the DevTestLab documentation page?

• Click on This page and the issue will open.

• https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devtest-labs/devtest-lab-overview

• Perhaps just link directly back to this discussion and ask them there to match the description with what we see above?
  • If you prefer just let me know I can do the same, however if you do, you can track until completed.

[Scot-Bernard]

Thank you for your detailed analysis and guidance. I've submitted the issue to the DevTestLabs documentation page here.

[brwilkinson]

Thank you @Scot-Bernard