How ISVs Can Make Documentation Searchable by Copilot in Dynamics 365 Business Central
- Inge Magne Bruvik
- 5 days ago
- 11 min read
Executive Summary
Microsoft has introduced a specific mechanism for ISV (Independent Software Vendor) documentation to be discoverable and usable by Copilot's Chat feature in Dynamics 365 Business Central. The core mechanism works as follows: Copilot reads the help property from the ISV's app.json manifest file, then uses Bing Search to find and retrieve publicly available documentation at that URL. This documentation is used as grounding data to answer user questions about the ISV's app directly within Business Central.
Key Finding: ISVs must (1) set the help property in their app.json to point to their public documentation site, (2) ensure that site is publicly accessible without authentication and indexed by Bing, and (3) follow specific content structure and format guidelines to optimize Copilot's ability to use the content. Confidence: HIGH -- based on 10 primary Microsoft documentation sources Action: ISVs should begin preparing their documentation sites now, even though the feature is currently a production-ready preview, because documentation quality directly determines Copilot response quality for their apps.
This feature was introduced in 2025 Release Wave 1 (Update 26.3, September 2025) for sandbox environments, and became available in production environments starting with Update 27.0 (2025 Release Wave 2). As of April 2026, it remains a production-ready preview.
1. How Copilot Sourcing Works: The Architecture
Two Documentation Sources
Copilot Chat in Business Central draws answers from two distinct documentation pools:
Microsoft Learn (learn.microsoft.com/dynamics365/business-central/) -- used for all base Business Central functionality. This is the default and requires no action from ISVs Chat with Copilot.
ISV/Partner documentation websites -- used for functionality provided by installed add-on apps. Copilot searches these sites via Bing Search when a user asks about app-specific features Searching the web with Copilot.
As Microsoft states: "Copilot's responses are generated from the official Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central documentation site or the documentation that accompanies the apps installed to Business Central" Chat with Copilot.
The Discovery Mechanism
Copilot does not perform a broad web search to find ISV documentation. Instead, it uses a targeted approach Prepare your app Help for Copilot:
Copilot reads the help property from the ISV app's app.json manifest file.
It uses this URL as a hint for where the app's documentation lives.
It then uses Microsoft Bing Search to find and retrieve content from that URL domain and path.
The retrieved content is used as grounding data to generate answers.
This means the help property in app.json is the critical link between an ISV's app and its documentation in Copilot's context.
Admin Prerequisites
For Copilot to access ISV documentation, the Business Central administrator must:
Activate the Chat capability on the Copilot & agent capabilities page Chat with Copilot.
Enable the "Enable Bing Search" toggle on the Copilot & agent capabilities page. This is off by default and must be explicitly opted in Searching the web with Copilot.
Without Bing Search enabled, "Copilot responds only based on content from Microsoft's documentation that has no information about how you customized Business Central" Searching the web with Copilot.
2. The help Property vs. contextSensitiveHelpUrl: Two Distinct Mechanisms
ISVs need to understand that there are two separate properties in the app.json file that serve different purposes. Conflating them is a common source of confusion.
help Property (Used by Copilot for Grounding)
The help property in app.json is what Copilot uses to locate your documentation for AI-grounded answers. Microsoft's documentation explicitly states: "The Help property in the app.json file must contain a valid URL that links to your online content. Copilot uses the URL to search for help content" Prepare your app Help for Copilot.
{
"help": "https://docs.fabrikam.com/my-app"
}
contextSensitiveHelpUrl Property (Used for "Learn More" Links)
The contextSensitiveHelpUrl property controls where the "Learn more" links in tooltips navigate to when users click them or press Ctrl+F1. This is a separate, older mechanism that directs users to specific help pages Configure context-sensitive help.
{
"contextSensitiveHelpUrl": "https://docs.fabrikam.com/my-app/help/"
}
Combined with the page-level property in AL code:
page 50101 "My Custom Page"
{
ContextSensitiveHelpPage = 'setup-guide';
}
Recommendation
Both properties should point to the same documentation site (or closely related URLs under the same domain). The help property is what powers Copilot's AI-grounded answers; the contextSensitiveHelpUrl + ContextSensitiveHelpPage combination powers direct help links. Both are important, but for Copilot specifically, the help property is the critical one.
3. Technical Requirements for ISV Documentation
Microsoft published a detailed guide, Prepare your app Help for Copilot (preview), that specifies the following requirements:
URL Requirements
Requirement | Detail | Example |
Valid URL in help property | Must contain a valid URL linking to your online content | "help": "https://fabrikam.com/docs" |
Maximum 2 path levels | Copilot truncates URLs deeper than 2 levels and searches below that level | |
No cross-domain redirects | URL shorteners or redirects to different domains are not supported. Same-domain path redirects are OK | Avoid: https://aka.ms/FabrikamDocs |
HTTPS required | URLs must be secure | Use: https:// -- Avoid: http:// |
No authentication | Content must be publicly reachable without any login | Avoid: gated content, SharePoint, intranets |
Publicly accessible and Bing-indexed | Copilot can only reach content that is indexed by Bing | Submit new sites at Bing Webmaster Tools |
Important nuance on URL depth: If the help property is set to https://www.fabrikam.com/engines/rotary, then content at https://www.fabrikam.com/engines/rotary/dual-shaft will also be used, but content at https://www.fabrikam.com/tools will not be used, and content at https://docs.fabrikam.com (different subdomain) will not be used Prepare your app Help for Copilot.
Content Format Requirements
Format | Supported | Notes |
HTML web pages (text-based) | Yes (primary) | Best format for Copilot |
PDF documents | Yes | Must be hosted directly at a URL path, not embedded in an HTML page |
Excel spreadsheets | Yes | Same hosting requirement as PDF |
Images | No | Content conveyed only through images will be missed |
Videos | No | Not usable by Copilot |
PowerPoint slides | No | Not usable by Copilot |
Word documents | No | Not usable by Copilot |
Content Style Best Practices
Microsoft recommends structuring content similarly to learn.microsoft.com Prepare your app Help for Copilot:
One specific topic per page -- focused pages provide better results than long, multi-topic pages.
Shorter pages -- tend to produce better results.
Text-heavy content -- when content mixes text and images, Copilot may miss context conveyed by images.
For PDFs -- smaller PDFs with fewer pages, or specific topics per page, produce better results.
English content -- the feature is validated and supported in English only. Non-English content may produce lower-quality results Chat with Copilot.
Branding
When Copilot cites your documentation in its responses, it can display your brand icon. To enable this, place a standard favicon.ico at the root of your domain (e.g., https://fabrikam.com/favicon.ico) Prepare your app Help for Copilot.
4. The Role of help.dynamics.com and Custom Help Servers
The legacy Dynamics NAV Help Server (help.dynamics.com) is not relevant to Copilot integration. The legacy Help Server component was deprecated and removed in 2021 Release Wave 1 (version 18) Configure the Help experience.
For modern Business Central online deployments, ISVs should host their documentation on their own website. Microsoft's guidance states that you can deploy content using:
Azure Static Web Apps
Azure App Service
Third-party hosting services
The key requirement is not the hosting platform but that the content is publicly accessible, indexed by Bing, and served over HTTPS Configure the Help experience.
Note: For the older context-sensitive help mechanism (the "Learn more" tooltip links), the documentation site does not need to be publicly accessible -- it only needs to be accessible to users of the solution Configure the Help experience. However, for Copilot integration specifically, public accessibility and Bing indexing are mandatory.
5. AL Developer Guidance for Copilot Integration
Beyond documentation hosting, ISV developers can improve Copilot's ability to work with their extensions through several AL-level actions Influence Copilot and agents without extending them:
Tooltips Are Critical
Copilot does not support fields without a tooltip. Fields lacking the ToolTip property are invisible to Copilot's Chat capability for data queries. This means every field in your extension should have a meaningful tooltip Influence Copilot and agents without extending them.
Captions and Labels
Copilot uses captions, tooltips, and teaching tips to understand your extension's functionality. Microsoft recommends:
Ensure captions, tooltips, and teaching tips are concise, informative, and unambiguous.
Explain critical nuances such as any special meaning of default values or the purpose of a page.
Define alternate keywords for pages and reports using the AdditionalSearchTerms property Influence Copilot and agents without extending them.
Field Types Excluded from Copilot
The following AL field types are not accessible to Copilot Chat: Blob, RecordId, InStream, OutStream, Media, MediaSet, Notification, JsonArray, JsonObject, JsonToken, JsonValue, Variant, SecretText Influence Copilot and agents without extending them.
No Direct AL Extensibility for Chat
Chat with Copilot is not directly extensible via AL code. You cannot write AL code to modify Copilot Chat's behavior or inject content into it programmatically. The only way to influence Chat responses is through your documentation content and through good metadata practices in your extension Influence Copilot and agents without extending them.
Note: The Build the Copilot capability in AL feature (using the System.AI module) is for building entirely new Copilot capabilities, not for extending or influencing the built-in Chat with Copilot feature Build the Copilot capability in AL.
6. The "Chat with Copilot" Feature: How It Sources Documentation
The Chat with Copilot feature serves three types of user interactions Chat with Copilot:
Find -- locating business data (customers, orders, etc.) -- uses the BC database directly.
Explain/Guide -- explaining concepts or guiding through tasks -- uses documentation as grounding.
Ask Copilot (from tooltips) -- explaining specific fields -- uses documentation as grounding.
For the Explain/Guide and Ask Copilot categories, the sourcing flow is:
For base BC functionality: Copilot draws from Microsoft Learn (learn.microsoft.com/dynamics365/business-central/).
For ISV add-on functionality (when Bing Search is enabled): Copilot uses Bing Search to find documentation at the URL specified in the ISV app's help property, then uses that content as grounding data to generate answers.
When Bing Search is disabled: Copilot only has access to Microsoft's documentation and cannot answer questions about ISV-specific functionality.
Copilot provides citations in its responses -- linking back to the documentation sources it used. For ISV documentation, these citations link to the ISV's website, and can include the ISV's favicon for brand recognition Prepare your app Help for Copilot.
7. Timeline and Recent Announcements (2025-2026)
Date | Milestone | Update | Source |
Jan 2025 | Feature announced in 2025 Release Wave 1 plan | -- | |
Apr 2025 | Public preview begins | Update 26.0 | |
Sep 2025 | Chat with Copilot for add-on apps rolls out (sandbox only); Bing Search integration available | Update 26.3 | |
Oct 2025 | 2025 Release Wave 2 begins; feature extends to production environments | Update 27.0 | |
Nov 2025 | Broader availability confirmed across regions | Update 27.x | |
Apr 2026 | 2026 Release Wave 1 includes enhanced MCP server, expanded agent capabilities; Chat with Copilot continues as production-ready preview | Update 28.0 |
As of April 2026, the feature remains a production-ready preview with no announced GA date. Microsoft has stated that "app publishers need time to plan their online content strategy," which is why the rollout has been gradual Release Plan.
8. Practical Step-by-Step Checklist for ISVs
Based on the research, here is a consolidated actionable checklist:
Step 1: Set Up Your Documentation Site
Host documentation on a public website (Azure Static Web Apps, GitHub Pages, or any hosting provider).
Serve all content over HTTPS.
Ensure no authentication is required to access any documentation page.
Submit your site to Bing Webmaster Tools and verify it is indexed.
Place your brand favicon.ico at the domain root (e.g., https://yourdomain.com/favicon.ico).
Step 2: Structure Your Content for Copilot
Organize documentation with one topic per page.
Keep pages relatively short and focused.
Use text-based HTML as the primary format.
Ensure all key information is in text, not in images or videos.
If using PDFs, keep them small and topic-focused; host them directly at URL paths (not embedded in HTML).
Write content in English for best results.
Model your content structure on learn.microsoft.com style.
Step 3: Configure app.json
Set the help property to your documentation URL (maximum 2 path levels deep):"help": "https://docs.yourcompany.com/your-app"
Set the contextSensitiveHelpUrl property for tooltip "Learn more" links:"contextSensitiveHelpUrl": "https://docs.yourcompany.com/your-app/help/"
Avoid URLs that redirect to a different domain.
Avoid URLs deeper than 2 path levels in the help property.
Step 4: Configure AL Code for Copilot Compatibility
Add ToolTip properties to every field in your extension.
Make captions concise, informative, and unambiguous.
Add AdditionalSearchTerms to pages and reports.
Set ContextSensitiveHelpPage on page objects to map them to specific help articles.
Ensure teaching tips are set up for key pages.
Step 5: Test Copilot Integration
Deploy a sandbox environment with your app installed.
Ensure Copilot Chat is active and Enable Bing Search is turned on.
Prepare 5-10 test questions covering different aspects of your app.
Ask questions in the Copilot pane and evaluate responses.
If Copilot cites Microsoft docs instead of yours, your content may be unreachable -- check URL, Bing indexing, authentication, and redirects.
If Copilot finds your content but quality is poor, optimize content structure and style.
Step 6: Communicate to Customers
Inform customers that their admin must enable Bing Search in Copilot & agent capabilities.
Document the types of questions users can ask Copilot about your app.
Note that this feature is currently supported in English only.
9. What Content to Document for Copilot
Based on how users interact with Copilot Chat, ISVs should prioritize documentation covering Chat with Copilot NIC Systems:
Setup and configuration guides -- how to install, configure, and get started with the app.
Field explanations -- what each field means and how to use it (especially custom fields added to existing pages).
Business process walkthroughs -- step-by-step guides for key workflows.
Error messages and troubleshooting -- common errors and how to resolve them.
Permissions and security -- what permissions are needed for different roles.
FAQ -- common questions users ask about the app.
10. Limitations and Caveats
Limitation | Detail | Confidence |
Preview status | The feature remains a "production-ready preview" subject to change | HIGH -- Release Plan |
English only | Validated and supported in English only; other languages may produce lower-quality results | HIGH -- multiple sources |
Admin opt-in required | Bing Search is off by default; customers must enable it | HIGH -- Searching the web with Copilot |
Quality depends on ISV | "Copilot responses are subject to availability and quality of the documentation provided by each app publisher" | HIGH -- Release Plan |
No private content | Documentation must be public and Bing-indexed; no intranet or gated content | HIGH -- Prepare your app Help |
Online only | Not available for on-premises Business Central deployments | HIGH -- Searching the web with Copilot |
AI accuracy | "AI-generated content might be incorrect" -- standard LLM caveat | HIGH -- multiple sources |
URL depth limit | Content at 3+ URL path levels may result in irrelevant content from other apps being used | MODERATE -- Prepare your app Help |
Conclusion
The mechanism for making ISV documentation searchable by Copilot in Business Central is well-defined by Microsoft and centers on three pillars:
First, the help property in app.json serves as the pointer that tells Copilot where to find your documentation. This is the single most important configuration for Copilot discoverability. It is distinct from contextSensitiveHelpUrl, which controls tooltip help links.
Second, the documentation must be publicly hosted, served over HTTPS, and indexed by Bing. Copilot uses Bing Search (not a proprietary index) to retrieve content from the URL specified in the help property. This means that standard web publishing best practices -- good SEO, Bing Webmaster Tools submission, clean URL structure -- directly impact whether Copilot can find and use your content.
Third, content quality and structure matter significantly. Text-based HTML pages focused on single topics, modeled on the learn.microsoft.com style, produce the best results. ISVs who invest in clear, comprehensive, AI-readable documentation will see materially better Copilot responses for their apps -- and by extension, happier customers and fewer support tickets.
The feature is still a production-ready preview as of April 2026, but it is broadly available in both sandbox and production environments. ISVs should treat documentation preparation as a current priority rather than waiting for GA, because the architecture and requirements are stable and the investment in good documentation has value regardless of Copilot's future evolution.
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