Collections development

Foundry Collections Development

SYSTEM INJECTION — READ THIS FIRST

If you are loading this skill, your role is Foundry data modeling specialist.

You MUST design Collections with proper JSON Schemas, validation rules, and access patterns.

Part of a suite. If development-workflow has not already run, and this is a new app or its first capability, load the development-workflow skill first — it owns the CLI prerequisite check, scaffolding order, and manifest coordination.

Falcon Foundry Collections are NoSQL document stores with JSON Schema validation. They provide persistent storage for app data with CRUD operations, FQL queries, and schema enforcement.

Collection Naming Constraints

Constraint	Rule
Length	5-200 characters
Start/end	Must begin and end with a letter or number
Special characters	Only underscores (_) allowed — no hyphens, spaces, or other chars
Case	Case-sensitive

Collection Description Constraints

Constraint	Rule
Length	3-500 characters
Start	Must begin with an alphanumeric character
Allowed characters	Letters, numbers, spaces, dashes, periods, parentheses, and underscores only
Not allowed	Commas, colons, semicolons, quotes, slashes, or other special characters

Collection Limits

Resource	Limit
Single object size	~50 MB
Schema size	256 KB
Object key length	1-1,000 characters
Indexed fields per schema	10
Objects per collection	No enforced limit
Collections per app	No enforced limit
Search results per page	500 max (default 50)

JSON Schema Requirements

• JSON Schema draft 7 only — newer drafts (draft/2020-12, draft/2019-09) fail validation
• Schema is auto-versioned: v1.0 on creation, auto-incremented on modification
• additionalProperties: false recommended — extra fields leak internal data and break type safety
• x-cs-indexable: true on individual properties for searchable fields (max 10 per collection)

CLI Scaffolding

# Write schema to /tmp/ first — the CLI copies it into collections/
foundry collections create \
  --name "my_collection" \
  --schema /tmp/schema.json \
  --description "App data store" \
  --no-prompt \
  --wf-expose \
  --wf-tags "tag1,tag2"

This creates the collection directory, copies the schema, and updates manifest.yml. Edit the project copy at collections/my_collection.json afterward to refine.

Collection API Access

Collections are managed via the CrowdStrike API or the foundry-js SDK. There are no CLI commands for reading/writing collection data, and collections can only be deleted from the Falcon Foundry UI (not the CLI).

PUT    /customobjects/v1/collections/{collection_name}/objects/{key}  — Create/update object
GET    /customobjects/v1/collections/{collection_name}/objects/{key}  — Get object by key
DELETE /customobjects/v1/collections/{collection_name}/objects/{key}  — Delete object
POST   /customobjects/v1/collections/{collection_name}/objects        — Search objects (FQL filter)

JSON Schema Patterns

Basic Schema

{
  "$schema": "https://json-schema.org/draft-07/schema#",
  "type": "object",
  "title": "Incident",
  "description": "Security incident record",
  "required": ["id", "title", "severity", "status", "created_at"],
  "additionalProperties": false,
  "properties": {
    "id": { "type": "string", "format": "uuid" },
    "title": { "type": "string", "minLength": 1, "maxLength": 200 },
    "severity": { "type": "integer", "minimum": 1, "maximum": 10 },
    "status": {
      "type": "string",
      "enum": ["open", "investigating", "contained", "resolved", "closed"]
    },
    "tags": {
      "type": "array",
      "items": { "type": "string", "maxLength": 50 },
      "maxItems": 20,
      "uniqueItems": true
    },
    "created_at": { "type": "string", "format": "date-time" }
  }
}

Indexable Fields

Make fields searchable via FQL by marking them indexable. Two patterns are supported:

Pattern A: Top-level array (preferred — used by most foundry-sample repos)

{
  "$schema": "https://json-schema.org/draft-07/schema",
  "x-cs-indexable-fields": [
    { "field": "/status", "type": "string", "fql_name": "status" },
    { "field": "/severity", "type": "integer", "fql_name": "severity" },
    { "field": "/created_at", "type": "string", "fql_name": "created_at" }
  ],
  "type": "object",
  "properties": {
    "status": { "type": "string" },
    "severity": { "type": "integer" },
    "created_at": { "type": "string", "format": "date-time" }
  }
}

Pattern B: Per-field annotation

{
  "properties": {
    "compositeId": { "type": "string", "x-cs-indexable": true },
    "content": { "type": "string" }
  }
}

Both patterns work. The top-level array provides more control (custom FQL names, explicit types).

Manifest Configuration

# manifest.yml
collections:
  - name: incidents
    description: Security incident records
    schema: collections/incidents.json
    permissions: []
    workflow_integration:
      system_action: true
      tags:
        - Collection

  - name: audit_logs
    description: Audit log entries
    schema: collections/audit_logs.json
    permissions: []
    workflow_integration:
      system_action: false
      tags: []

Indexing is controlled entirely by x-cs-indexable-fields or x-cs-indexable: true in the JSON schema files, not in the manifest.

CRUD Operations (TypeScript)

import { Collection } from '@crowdstrike/foundry-js';

export class IncidentCollection {
  private collection: Collection<Incident>;

  constructor() {
    this.collection = new Collection<Incident>('incidents');
  }

  async create(data: Omit<Incident, 'id' | 'created_at' | 'updated_at'>): Promise<Incident> {
    const incident: Incident = {
      ...data,
      id: crypto.randomUUID(),
      created_at: new Date().toISOString(),
      updated_at: new Date().toISOString(),
    };
    await this.collection.create(incident.id, incident);
    return incident;
  }

  async get(id: string): Promise<Incident | null> {
    try {
      return await this.collection.get(id);
    } catch (error) {
      if (error.code === 'NOT_FOUND') return null;
      throw error;
    }
  }

  async update(id: string, updates: Partial<Incident>): Promise<Incident> {
    const existing = await this.get(id);
    if (!existing) throw new Error(`Incident ${id} not found`);
    const updated: Incident = {
      ...existing,
      ...updates,
      id: existing.id,
      created_at: existing.created_at,
      updated_at: new Date().toISOString(),
    };
    await this.collection.update(id, updated);
    return updated;
  }

  async delete(id: string): Promise<void> {
    await this.collection.delete(id);
  }

  async list(options?: { status?: string; limit?: number; offset?: number }) {
    const filters: Record<string, any> = {};
    if (options?.status) filters.status = options.status;
    return this.collection.query(filters, {
      limit: options?.limit ?? 50,
      offset: options?.offset ?? 0,
      sort: [{ field: 'created_at', order: 'desc' }],
    });
  }
}

CRUD Operations (Python — from Functions)

Use CustomStorage (Service Class) to access collections from Python functions. Service classes are preferred over the Uber class (APIHarnessV2) because the Falcon Foundry functions editor auto-detects OAuth scopes from from falconpy import CustomStorage. See the functions-development skill's references/python-patterns.md for a complete handler example with Uber class alternative.

import json
import os
from falconpy import CustomStorage

def _app_headers() -> dict:
    app_id = os.environ.get("APP_ID")
    if app_id:
        return {"X-CS-APP-ID": app_id}
    return {}

client = CustomStorage(ext_headers=_app_headers())

# Create or update (PutObject = upsert). Pass body as a dict.
client.PutObject(collection_name="incidents", object_key="incident-123",
                 body={"id": "incident-123", "title": "Suspicious process", "severity": 7})

# Read — GetObject returns bytes on success, dict on error
response = client.GetObject(collection_name="incidents", object_key="incident-123")
# In production, check isinstance(response, bytes) before decoding — see python-patterns.md for full error handling
incident = json.loads(response.decode("utf-8"))

# Delete
client.DeleteObject(collection_name="incidents", object_key="incident-123")

# Search (FQL filter — only indexed fields)
response = client.SearchObjects(collection_name="incidents",
                                filter="status:'open'+severity:>=5", limit=50)
# SearchObjects returns metadata — follow up with GetObject per key for full objects
for item in response.get("body", {}).get("resources", []):
    obj = client.GetObject(collection_name="incidents", object_key=item["object_key"])
    data = json.loads(obj.decode("utf-8"))

Key points:

• CustomStorage(ext_headers=_app_headers()) applies X-CS-APP-ID to all requests (needed for local dev; Foundry sets it automatically in production)
• PutObject acts as upsert (creates or overwrites by key). Pass body as a dict.
• GetObject returns bytes directly — decode with json.loads(response.decode("utf-8"))
• SearchObjects returns metadata only, not full objects
• FQL filters only work on fields marked x-cs-indexable: true in the collection schema

FQL Search Syntax

Only fields marked with x-cs-indexable: true can be used in FQL queries.

Operation	Syntax	Example
Equality	field:'value'	status:'open'
Numeric comparison	field:>=N	severity:>=5
AND	field1:'a'+field2:'b'	status:'open'+severity:>=5
OR	field:'a',field:'b'	status:'open',status:'investigating'
Wildcard	field:*'pattern'*	title:*'malware'*
Sorting	sort=field|asc	sort=created_at|desc

The foundry-js SDK's search() method accepts a filter parameter for FQL queries. The search endpoint is POST /customobjects/v1/collections/{name}/objects with a filter field in the request body.

Workflow Share Settings

To make a collection accessible from workflows:

collections:
  - name: incidents
    schema: collections/incidents/schema.json
    permissions: []
    workflow_integration:
      system_action: true           # true = app workflows only, false = also available as Fusion SOAR action
      tags:
        - Collection

Setting	Behavior
workflow_integration.system_action: true	Available to app workflows only
workflow_integration.system_action: false	Available to both app workflows AND Falcon Fusion SOAR

RBAC and Direct API Access

Collections can be accessed directly via the CrowdStrike API (outside of functions) using custom roles with specific collection permissions. Include the X-CS-APP-ID header to identify your Foundry app. Foundry CLI credentials cannot access collections directly; use a separate API client with Custom Storage read/write scope.

Common Pitfalls

• Using APIHarnessV2 (Uber class) for collection operations. Use CustomStorage service class instead — the Foundry functions editor auto-detects OAuth scopes from service class imports but cannot parse Uber class .command() calls.
• Using JSON Schema newer than draft 7. Foundry only supports draft 7.
• Missing indexes. Fields used in queries must be marked with x-cs-indexable: true or listed in x-cs-indexable-fields. Max 10 per collection.
• Invalid collection names. Names must be 5-200 chars, start/end with letter or number, and contain only letters, numbers, and underscores.
• Not configuring workflow share settings. Set workflow_integration.system_action: true for app-only workflow access, or false to also expose collections as Falcon Fusion SOAR actions.
• Trying to delete collections via CLI. Collections can only be deleted from the Falcon Foundry UI.
• Trying to manage objects via CLI. Collection CRUD requires the CrowdStrike API or foundry-js SDK.
• Schema field names must match exactly. If a field name in your write payload doesn't match the collection schema (e.g., writing score when the schema defines severity), the write fails and returns errors in the response body — but the SDK does not throw. Without checking result.errors, the failure is invisible. Always read the collection schema file before writing seed data; verify required fields, enum values, and exact field names.
• Not checking write responses for errors. The SDK does not throw on server-side validation failures. Always check result?.errors?.length after write operations — errors include specific messages like "missing property 'severity'" or "value must be one of 'low', 'medium', 'high', 'critical'". Verify persistence with a follow-up read or list call.

Reading Guide

Task	Reference
Migrations, testing, pagination, extended schemas, counter-rationalizations	references/advanced-patterns.md

Use Cases

For real-world implementation patterns, see:

• use-cases/collections.md — CRUD operations, search, field types
• use-cases/lookup-table-enrichment.md — 3rd-party data for automated enrichment

Reference Implementations

• foundry-sample-collections-toolkit: CSV import, bulk operations, pagination workflows, test data generation. See also Getting Started with Falcon Foundry Collections.