Linter rule - no ___location expressions outside of parameter default values

This rule finds resourceGroup().___location or deployment().___location used outside of a parameter default value.

Linter rule code

Use the following value in the Bicep configuration file to customize rule settings:

no-loc-expr-outside-params

Solution

resourceGroup().___location and deployment().___location should only be used as the default value of a parameter.

Template users may have limited access to regions where they can create resources. The expressions resourceGroup().___location or deployment().___location could block users if the resource group or deployment was created in a region the user can't access, thus preventing them from using the template.

Best practice suggests that to set your resources' locations, your template should have a string parameter named ___location. If you default the ___location parameter to resourceGroup().___location or deployment().___location instead of using these functions elsewhere in the template, users of the template can use the default value when convenient but also specify a different ___location when needed.

resource storageaccount 'Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts@2023-04-01' = {
  ___location: resourceGroup().___location
}

You can fix the failure by creating a ___location property that defaults to resourceGroup().___location and use this new parameter instead:

param ___location string = resourceGroup().___location

resource storageaccount 'Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts@2023-04-01' = {
  ___location: ___location
}

The following example fails this test because ___location is using resourceGroup().___location but isn't a parameter:

  var ___location = resourceGroup().___location

You can fix the failure by turning the variable into a parameter:

  param ___location string  = resourceGroup().___location

If you're using Azure PowerShell to deploy to a subscription, management group, or tenant, you should use a parameter name other than ___location. The New-AzDeployment, New-AzManagementGroupDeployment, and New-AzTenantDeployment commands have a parameter named ___location. This command parameter conflicts with the parameter in your Bicep file. You can avoid this conflict by using a name such as rgLocation.

You can use ___location for a parameter name when deploying to a resource group, because New-AzResourceGroupDeployment doesn't have a parameter named ___location.

Next steps

For more information about the linter, see Use Bicep linter.