Static analysis to determine resources not available

[SteveL-MSFT]

Summary of the new feature / enhancement

Add a new cmdline subcommand to analyze a config to determine what resources are not available before deploying. This can allow higher level tools to install resources.

Proposed technical implementation details (optional)

No response

[michaeltlombardi]

I think this dovetails with the other static analysis proposals like linting - is this better implemented as a core command for DSC (e.g. dsc config validate) or as an extension that makes commands available?

[SteveL-MSFT]

I think this dovetails with the other static analysis proposals like linting - is this better implemented as a core command for DSC (e.g. dsc config validate) or as an extension that makes commands available?

In this specific case, the validation would naturally occur within the engine. It's basically leveraging existing logic in the engine, but with a flag that indicates "don't actually execute the config after pre-validation of the resources"