Decision Manager Studio
The developer half of the platform. Business users author in the Decision Manager browser console; operators run Decision Server in the browser; developers work here — same repository, Manager + Server APIs, vocabulary in the loop, a decision trace that says why a rule did not fire, governed deploy, and Git.
Desktop IDE
Current extension build
Decision Manager v0.4.5
638de37d005da937c98c90a2064c688833d8813f7811db9c1f4431ebe830cb13Install for
One-line install (Terminal)
Preparing install command for this host…
All platforms
What this install does and does not do
Extension 0.4.5 · product 0.1.0 · checksums on the download page. Prefer VSCodium (Open VSX) over Microsoft VS Code for marketplace terms.
Current build
Decision Manager v0.4.5
494 kB · built 2026-08-05 · requires VS Code ^1.85.0 · 264 commands
Verify what you downloaded
638de37d005da937c98c90a2064c688833d8813f7811db9c1f4431ebe830cb13Compare before you install: shasum -a 256 decision-manager-0.4.5.vsix — the value above is measured from the file this page serves, at build time.
The extension is distributed as a .vsix. It is not on the Visual Studio Marketplace, so there is nothing to search for — install the file.
code --install-extension decision-manager-0.4.5.vsixRun it from the folder you downloaded into. Restart VS Code afterwards so the language server starts against your settings.
Extensions view → the ⋯ menu at the top of the panel → Install from VSIX… → pick the downloaded file.
A reachable DecisionManager deployment. The platform is not one process, and the extension talks to three of them — each command knows which.
| Service | Default port | Used for |
|---|---|---|
| platform | 8081 | sign-in, /api/me, workspaces |
| manager | 8082 | rulesets, vocabulary, validate, dry-run, AI |
| runtime | 8083 | execute, deployments, warehouse |
| admin | 8084 | members, audit, license, groups (optional) |
Pointing all three at one URL works only if a gateway genuinely serves all three; otherwise the deploy and governance commands answer 404, which reads as a missing feature rather than a misconfiguration.
Add an instance, then sign in
Decision Manager: Add Instance… asks for a label, the platform URL, the manager URL and which environment this is. Sign in with email and password or paste an access token — either way it goes into VS Code SecretStorage, never into settings.json.
Find your ruleset in the explorer
The Decision Manager view shows the real hierarchy: workspace → project → decision service → ruleset → version → rule. Open a version as a folder to browse it with ordinary VS Code navigation, diff and search.
Edit a rule with the vocabulary in the loop
Open a rule as BAL and press Ctrl+Space. Completions are your bound vocabulary's terms. A phrase that is not in the vocabulary gets a diagnostic on the exact span, with the server's own explanation. Saving parses server-side and refuses rather than writing something the engine would reject.
Run it and see why
Run Decision and Trace gives a verdict for every rule — fired, applicable, or not applicable — and for the ones that did not apply, the individual conditions that were false. Pin the run as a test case in one command.
Submit, approve, publish, deploy
The Governance view drives the lifecycle. Approval requires a different user than the submitter, and the extension knows who you are before you click rather than after a 409.
Completion, hover, signature help and validation, all from the vocabulary bound to your ruleset. The extension contains no rule parser of its own — every question about meaning is answered by your server, so the editor and the engine cannot disagree.
A per-rule verdict and the individual false conditions, in the vocabulary's own words. Produced by asking the engine a second question, never by re-evaluating conditions in the editor.
The platform's test suites in VS Code's own test panel, with diffs on failure and one command to turn a decision you just checked into a stored case.
Draft, review, approved, published, deployed — with separation of duties checked against the signed-in user, and every refusal carrying the platform's own remedy text.
Export a version into a working tree in the same layout the server's Git sync uses, so a diff against a pushed repository is a real diff. Native VS Code diff between a version and what is deployed.
Right-click an ODM export folder to analyse it. The report names every construct that has no equivalent before you commit anything — analysis never writes.
Syntax highlighting, live diagnostic squigglies, and inline rule test suite runner.
Automated ruleset branch diffing, remote sync, and CLI quality gate integration.
Rule Designer is the honest baseline for ODM teams evaluating a desktop authoring move. These are structural differences, not a feature-count race — including where Rule Designer still leads.
Business authors and operators still use the browser Decision Manager and Decision Server consoles — the extension is the developer surface, not a full console replacement. IDE vs browser consoles
Stated here rather than discovered after you install it.
Not published to the Visual Studio Marketplace. When it is, the identifier will be decisionmanager.decision-manager and this page will link to the listing alongside the .vsix, which stays available for air-gapped installs.
Decision Manager Studio is also packaged as a branded desktop IDE (macOS, Windows, Linux) with this extension pre-installed. Desktop builds use Open VSX for optional extensions — not the Visual Studio Marketplace — so some Microsoft-only extensions will not install. Studio does not auto-update: install new versions by re-downloading the release package.
Packaged desktop artifacts land under studio/out/artifacts/ (and GitHub Releases for published tags). Build and policy notes: docs/STUDIO-BUILD.md.