Custom Fields Continued (Relationships)...

          We were done with just the two fields Auto Number and Formula Field, In this section we will move on and consider the other fields. Moving on with the fields lets consider:

Lookup Relationship: 

     Lets break it down so that we could actually understand this. What is a lookup? Something like looking up the Dictionary or the Phone Book? exactly that is what it is up to some extent. It took me some time to actually understand what these were. Unless you implement them it would be tough to know the difference between the Lookup Relationship or the Master-Detail Relationship.  Consider  this I am a customer and you have a business and would like to keep a record of customers and as to what Company they work for. What will you do to achieve this? You can use two measures :
      The dumb way: Create a customer object/table and have the fields for consumers and as to where they work and details of the work place.
       The smart way: Create two different tables each for Customers and the place where they work. And on the customers object/table put a field place a reference that points to the place this customer works.
       So, the obvious question that might arise would be that why break a single table into two different tables, and what difference does it really make. This very line will clear your doubt if you have.Suppose we have this single table then for every Customer creation we will have to fill in the individual details of the company. Now suppose a customer changes his company now we need to edit the company details contained in the Customer Detail.Yes all those fields that belong to the Company on the Customer Object/table. Okay what if the Company of size 500-employees itself was relocating ? Visit individual customers and update the Information?? Not really you would like to do that.. What we could have done could have been to create the two tables and then simply update the information to the Company object and the Customers would be still referencing the same Company. Now if the customer moves to different company then if the Company exists in the Company table then well and good else we create a Company by the name and reference the customer to this company. As employees add up to this new company, we would have to simply create a reference of this new customer to the company.


Master-Detail Relationships:

      The name speaks for itself Master-Detail (something serious). There is not much of a difference between the Lookup and Master-Detail Relationships when it comes to usage they both behave just the same.

The Difference (Important):
 
        The difference between the Lookup and Master-Detail is asked in almost all Interviews. The differences will make you distinguish which is a Master-Detail and which is a Lookup. I will not relate these differences with what is available on other blogs. So here we go.

        Suppose we have a Lookup relationship and a Master-Detail Relationship between two objects in two different scenarios. Then the differences we will notice would be the following:

•          The Mater detail relationship can be used for roll-up summary. While Lookup can not be used for that purpose.    

•         The security of the Master is endowed to the detail side. Which means who ever has access to the master will have access to the detail. Unlike in Lookup. Each of the side has their very own security.

•         If the master record is deleted the detail record get deleted on own. Suppose we had deleted a Company then all its Employees would have been deleted If we had selected a Master-Detail relationship instead of a Lookup Relationship.

•         The reference field on the child can not be left blank when Master-Detail is being used, it is always required. While when a lookup is used, the reference field can be left blank until we have not set it to be a required field.

•          You change the type of data i.e you can convert lookup to Master-Detail under the condition that the reference field on the child is not Blank/Null. As Master-Detail the reference field can not be left Blank.

 Er.Anup Prakash
SalesForce Certified Developer
anup.prakash@hotmail.com

           

Custom Fields.

In the Previous Page we discussed in brief about Custom Fields and Standard Fields. You have had a rough Idea about the table/object. Now lets take a step further and get familiar with the different types of field/colums that we can create in an object/table..Salesforce Custom Field Types are as below:

• Auto Number.  
• Formula.
• Lookup Relationship.
• Master-Detail Relationship.
• Checkbox.
• Currency.
• Date.Date/Time.
• Email.
• Geolocation.
• Number.
• Percent.
• Phone.
• Picklist.
• Picklist (Multi-Select).
• Text.
• Text Area.
• Text Area (Long).
• Text Area (Rich).  
• Text (Encrypted).
• URL.  

   Now Lets Discuss Each of them one by one.

 

   Auto Number:

When we have this field in the object/table a Unique Number is automatically assigned to the new record/row in the object/table. Suppose you have a requirement in which you have a Product Table and you wish to Provide a unique Identification to each product.. In this case we can use the Auto Number type. We can Provide the Display format as per our wish/requirement. This Link provides further detail on Display Format.    Formula.  A field whose value is calculated with the help of a formula. Suppose we have a requirement in which we have a requirement in which we are to Provide the expiry date of a product and the expiry date of the product is 6 months from the date of manufacture. So what we can do is that we can use the Standard field "Created Date" as the date of Manufacture and then a formula field that calculated the Expiry date as the 180 months after the Manufacture day.        Click on Advanced Formula Click on Insert Field. See the below screen Shot. Add 180 Click on Check Syntax. Click on Next. Make sure you are only checking the System Administrator  Profile  The other Fields will be covered in the next two pages.

Standard and Custom Objects

          The Basic Entity of Salesforce are the sObjects. sObjects comprise of  Standard and Custom Objects. Didn't Understand?? Even I wouldn't have. Standard and Custom Objects are nothing but Tables. So whats the difference between them. As the name Suggests Standard Objects-Objects(Tables)which are Standard/Provided by Salesforce. Now you can feel good because you know what custom objects are. See I knew you would know it. So now I'll just write it- Custom objects are the Objects/tables that we create as per our requirement. 

Important: Whenever you see something like "__c"  appended at the end of a name. It indicates that that entity is custom. 

              Now Imagine a empty table!! Is it of any good?? No, right?? So there you are here is when we require fields. So the Standard Objects have the Standard fields. And the Custom objects have Custom fields. However we can add custom fields to the Standard Objects. This is done to fulfill our requirement. 

               To access the Standard Objects click on our Name->Setup->Customize. Here you will get to see a list of names Like "Opportunity, Case, Account, Contact, Lead, Campaign, Idea.. etc". And When you click the Name of these sObjects You get to See Fields. And upon clicking it you will be able to see the fields to these Object. Now to access the Custom Objects Click your Name>>Setup>>Create>>Objects. Here you will get to see the Custom Objects. And upon clicking the custom object you will see two sections -

1. Standard Fields. These are the Standard Fields created By the System and can not be deleted.
2. Custom Fields & Relationships: These are the Custom Fields created by us. Don't be confused By the term relationship, we'll discuss it in the next page. 

*You might have to create a Custom object iff not created.

Lets create ours:

•  Click On Setup.
• Click on Create.
• Click on Object. 

Click on Save..

Congrats the first Object is created.

Queries are welcomed..

First Step to as a Salesforce Developer

           So the things would get exciting now. I'll first accomplish the Customization part and then gradually move on to the Programming aspect. You have an Idea about the devil now so let’s command and be a master to the beast. First you have to create a developer account on Salesforce. To create a developer account you can visit the Sign Up page. When filling the page try being a little careful while putting the Username and try to avoid using your email address here. An then on validating and creating a password you would get your home screen. There is a lots to study in the customization itself. There are several types of editions that Salesforce provides which can be viewed on Edition Page. These Editions provide various capabilities that would be present in their CRM. We can create various applications on the force.com platform like ones to manage the

•  Contents at different levels. They compromise for file Sharing, Versifying and Content Management System.
• Transactions: Like Banking system, some payment system.
• Processes: Leave management System, or a process that requires approval.
• Data: These types of applications should have an excellent Database and applications like CRM etc can be built.

Salesforce Home Page

A few of the Components

Before we start Implement we need to know what we would be doing so. A small application that we could create would be a student management system. In this System we have a multiple schools under the same name. and each have their very own Principal, teachers. and the evaluation of students is performed and the score is tracked. The teachers can store the educational articles on the web and can be accessed anytime and anywhere. The teachers should not be allowed to create students only the Principal can approve if a student can be a part of school and as to which class he will belong to if approved. So it would be everything that is required to run a school's educational system. The basic unit on which Salesforce applications function is called a sObject or a Object. A sObject is a table that we create to save various data.

Before getting off with Salesforce.com

A beginner in Salesforce?? No need to fret…just read on: 

Now, the next question that comes to mind after a brief introduction (previous post)  about the salesforce.com is: Will you be able to get through? And What are the things that you will be facing?

As they say a known devil is always better than an unknown devil! The purpose of this post is not to scare you but to give you an Idea of exciting and not so exciting things that you would get to see, learn and implement in salesforce.com . A salesforce.com programmer is one of the best quality programmers as he needs to know the architecture, database, programming languages and designing of applications. So you actually get to implement all spheres of the web and the things that you might have learned during your college days.

The salesforce.com platform can be divided into two categories for developers:

• Customization

• Programming 

Customization is the initial step to get going with salesforce.com. It uses point and click principal to perform operations. It comprises of creating objects (tables with columns to store records), creation of users (people who would use the application), profiles (setting for the application that the user would use) and roles (a hierarchy into which the users fall and functionalities associated with them). Security features also come under the customization. Most of the basic tasks can be performed using customization. Customization plays a very important role and lays the foundation for any programming.

Programming knowledge should be enhanced on acquiring a strong knowledge of customization. That is what I would recommend personally. An added advantage would be the knowledge of any Oops language, although it is not a compulsion. We would use the programming techniques when the provided features of salesforce.com are incapable to achieve its goal. Apex and Visualforce are the two programming languages that one will work on. 

Any query or suggestion is most welcome!

Written By : - Er. Anup Prakash (anup@forceapp.biz) (Certified Developer).

Edited By : - Er. Akbar Ali Khan (uckbarr@yahoo.co.in) (Mechanical Engineer)

What is Salesforce.com?

Salesforce:

                 What is Salesforce? This is the first question that pops up at someone’s mind when they hear it for the first time! When I heard it for the first time at  the beginning of the year 2011, I thought it was some weird stuff that one of my friends was learning and was not going to get anything out of it. A cynical approach? May be, this is the way I am programmed! Okay coming back to the Salesforce Story:  In the year 2011 I had some backlog and a degree was a distant dream or figuratively it was still couple of years away. So I quit my BPO Job after 2 years in 2013. I needed something huge to get into IT-Companies.

                   After doing some research the thing that I zeroed on was "Salesforce". Not knowing what it was I decided to get into it and know it inside out. After paying  a handsome 1000 USD I got to know the basic of Salesforce.  I didn't know what Cloud Computing was, so after 2 weeks I was able to understand that Salesforce.com wasn't just a website. It was an entire application in the form of a website. I fell in Love with it and mind you, it wasn’t a love at first sight!  As the days passed I got to know the beautiful functionalities of Salesforce. For Beginners the earlier you realize the better it is for you! "Salesforce.com is not just a website, It’s an application/Software in the form of a website." If you observe the complex plumage of Salesforce.com you will realize it has a some interesting feathers like -  force.com, site.com, data.com etc. we'll discuss those later.

There are two big terms "SaaS" & "PaaS":

• · SaaS - Software as a Service

•    PaaS - Platform as a Service

What is the difference between these two?

                These questions are often asked in interviews as well. The simplest answer to this is Salesforce.com is SaaS where as Force.com is a PaaS. So what are these? I'll throw an example and you'll catch it at once. Have you ever used a software or played a game?? Yeah I confess – A lame question! Obviously you have! So there you are. That is the half of SaaS. Okay now consider that you are given access to the software/game unless and until you are paying a fee. Unless it’s the owner's wish to give you the access. So SaaS is a Software access just as a Service.  Got it?? Cool!! Now moving on to PaaS. Have you used a Turbo C++/ Eclipse/ Netbeans IDE?  Those are Platforms on which we work to create applications/software/programs. So a service provided so as to develop applications on the cloud are known as Platform as a Service.

So that was a rough Idea about Salesforce.com. Any query or suggestion is most welcome!

Written By : - Er. Anup Prakash (anup.prakash@hotmail.com) (Certified Developer).

Edited By : - Er. Akbar Ali Khan (uckbarr@yahoo.co.in) (Mechanical Engineer)