New Trailhead Maintenance Modules!!

One of our last meetups with the Sevilla Salesforce Developer Group was planned so we could start checking the new Trailhead Maintenance exams. We were quite excited about this new approach to maintenance exams and check its flexibility.

That was back in early May 2018 and we had been really early birds, as the maintenance exams weren't ready as modules in Trailhead back then... I've been waiting for this quite a while now, and I've been able to try it for my Platform App Builder and my Platform Developer I certifications.

I have to say that the merge process between the Kryterion account and the Trailhead one is very intuitive and slick! Well done Trailhead team! No fuss, just email validation and merge is done!

So it's all ready now to go for it!

This is the beautiful celebration message you get when you pass your Platform Developer I Certification Maintenance module.

It's a really well structured module, supposed to take 15 minutes to complete, with explanations about some of the new features in Summer '18, like the following:
- new Lightning Styles for Visualforce pages
- new Lightning URL formats
- the UITheme methods to find out the environment in which the user is accessing Salesforce
- the new methods to retrieve the Record Type infos

No, I found more problems with the Platform App Builder Certification Maintenance modules...
I have to say that I find it really helpful that you have to actually do a flow to pass it, as it makes sure you do get to use the new features, so that's a really good way of learning and making sure we all understand the changes.
Maybe my problems are related to the fact that I'm more developer oriented than App Builder oriented, but I think other issues I found were related to the requirements in the challenge being quite open to interpretation...

However, it's really good that Trailhead is asking us to create the flow. It's been a very long time since I created or played with my last Flow... The estimated time to complete this is 30 minutes, and I have to say it took me way longer, as I was getting an error message that wasn't very helpful...

My flow was working, and I tested it before running the check, but I was getting this error message again and again; the reason why I was getting this message was that I was using a Text variable to hold the message String, and I solved this by hard-coding it to the Display message in my Screen element. This was the most annoying thing, as the message returned by the checking utility wasn't very helpful...

My recommendations when you do your maintenance:
- strictly follow the naming conventions indicated in the requirements list
- do not over-engineer your solution, just do what you're asked
- do not create lots of variables, you can use hard-coded values within your message elements

And finally, if you get error messages, be creative and find multiple ways of doing the same thing! I think that's a really good way of training your brain!

New Trailheads: the Salesforce Nautical Chart!

We've been joking about pirates lately. The Salesforce community has been talking a lot about it and we've been showing our sense of humour. See related tweets...

And just about the same time, Salesforce has released some new Trailhead content. It's like a Nautical Chart to guide your Salesforce navigation.

And this has just come out on time for our next DUG in Sevilla, we'll be doing some Trailhead sessions, and some of the attendees are beginners who have never worked with Salesforce, so perfect timing for the arrival of this new Trailhead. The key to a successful sailing!

Navigate the Salesforce Advantage

This new Trailhead will help us learn about the key differentiators that drive Salesforce's success: core values, innovative technology and vibrant ecosystem.

These are the 4 modules that make this new Trail:

Salesforce Success Model

Learn about who Salesforce is and the Four Core Differentiators (10 minutes)

Link here.

Salesforce Cloud Benefits

Understand the success that a complete CRM brings to your business and how it can help you evolve as your business needs change (10 minutes)

Link here.

Salesforce Technology Basics

Get to know the underlying technology principles of Salesforce; trusted Cloud, Multitenancy, Metadata and Development and Customisation of the platform (40 minutes)

Link here.

Salesforce Ecosystem

An insight to the Salesforce community, the available resources, events, and so forth... (20 minutes)

Link here.

Build an application on Salesforce App Cloud from start to finish

December 2015...

The force has just awakened...

And the Trailhead Team have created an incredible new project that helps you wake up in the force too... you can build your first application on Salesforce App Cloud from start to finish.

Build a Battle Station App

This links to the new Trailhead project

The purpose of this project is to guide you through the process of building an application on Salesforce App Cloud from start to finish.

You will not be required to write any code; so don't panic if you're new to App Cloud, because the purpose of this Trailhead project is to introduce you to the basics of app building.

You need a free Developer Edition ORG to complete this project. If you don't have one, you can create a new one here.

This new app you are going to build is a project management app that allows users to manage the resources and supplies used to build a Battle Station.

You will learn point-and-click skills that are applicable to building almost anything on App Cloud. Here's what you'll be doing: 

     - Create the app and a data model for the application. This simple application requires only a few custom objects with a small number of fields. 

     - Modify the user interface on the browser and on Salesforce1 Mobile using page layouts, compact layouts, and global actions

     - Implement business logic using formulas, validation rules and a process builder

     - Build reports and dashboards to track the status of supplies and analyze how well the company manages resources.

Go get your hands on this new Trailhead project and complete it by the 31st of December for a chance to win some amazing prizes:
     - 3 PlayStation 4 Consoles
     - 10 Sphero Robots
     - 15 Air Hogs Remote Control Quad Copters

More new content

If you're not new to Salesforce there are good news for you too! There is some new Trailhead content for you to look at and earn some new badges! 

Admin Advanced Trail 

Reach all star admin status by tackling more advanced Salesforce features.

Link here. 

   

Apex Integration Services Module 

Integrate with external apps using Apex REST and SOAP services.

Link here. 

    

Advanced Formulas Module 

Learn how to write clean, easy-to-understand formulas for complex use cases.

Link here. 

    

Lightning Chatter Basics Module 

Get started with enterprise social collaboration in the new Lightning Experience.

Link here. 
 
 

Lightning Data Management Module 

Learn how to import and export data in the new Lightning Experience.

Link here. 
  
 
 

Application Lifecycle Management (rewritten) 

Learn best practices for team app development and lifecycle management.

Link here.


 

Salesforce Trailhead: Learning Lightning Development

We are just 2 weeks away from Dreamforce 2015, I'm going again this year, so I have to get up to speed with the latest features. After last week's announcement to Meet the New Salesforce you can't help but get your hands on learning the new Lightning Experience, and what better way to do it than with Trailhead? None. So that's why I encourage everyone wanting to start building Lightning components to check it out. It's also a really nice way of starting your preparation for what's to come with the new Salesforce release in Winter '16.

The Lightning Experience Developer Trail takes you through 5 modules to show you an overview of the different points of view of the new Salesforce development approach:

• Lightning Experience Basics 
• Lightning Experience Development 
• Visualforce & Lightning Experience 
• Lightning Components 
• Lightning Design System

I consider it quite important to highlight that the Lightning Experience is not fully terminated and rolled out to the whole platform at the time of writing this post (September 2015), and even if it brings new capabilities that weren't available before, it is still "Work In Progress" and it doesn't support all the features that Salesforce Classic does at the moment.

In Salesforce's own words: "Lightning components are still in their infancy and not all the features you’re used to in Visualforce are fully supported yet."

Just be patient and let the Salesforce team do their job. We'll definitely be getting updates from them with the progress through the usual channels...

This is what you can expect from each of the Modules. As usual, you will earn some new badges and you can win up to 5800 points!


Lightning Experience Basics

Find out about what the Lightning Experience is and how it's different to Salesforce Classic. View examples of the look and feel of the new interface.

Get advice on how to decide whether the new experience is right for you.

Instructions on how to enable it in your ORG.



Lightning Experience Development

An overview of the impact of the new User Experience on the typical Developer tools, like Apex, the API, Visualforce, and others.

Recommendations on what technology you should use depending on the requirements of your application. One of the features from the Lightning Experience I'm more excited about is the fact that you don't have to worry about compatibility accross devices and browsers, it's all taken care of for you!

Guidance on what to do with Packaged applications or the Apps in the AppExchange to accommodate the new Lightning Experience.

Visualforce & Lightning Experience

You will find out the ways in which you can keep using Visualforce within the Lightning Experience.

Set up your work environment for a better development experience: code editor, page viewers and review in multiple environments.

Discover how Visualforce pages behave when running in Lightning Experience and how to share them between both experiences, as well as the styling considerations to bare in mind.

Lightning Components

This module describes what Lightning Components are and how the new Lightning Components framework differs from the Visualforce one. Prepare for a good 4 hours of exciting training with this module, because this is where you will write some actual code and connect your Trailhead to your Developer ORG to create some Lightning Components.

An overview of the different techniques available for Lightning Components is given in this module: server-side and client-side controllers, Apex and JavaScript...

Lightning Design System

This final module goes into the Design principals used in the Lightning Experience. You get introduced to the Block-Element-Modifier syntax (BEM) for styling your components.

Some explanations about the Grid System, that is a good way to understand the layout that your Lightning Components will use.

You will find out next the recommended ways of accessing your Data in Salesforce from your Lightning Components; and also how to include Avatars and Icons within your components.

The final activity of this module helps you build Record Home Page making use of several components!

And now you're all set to understand MOST of what people will be talking about at Dreamforce '15!

It was helpful for me, so I hope this is also of help for you.
 

Trailhead by Salesforce: Detective Learning with Event Monitoring!

If you are thinking of learning Salesforce, or you already know Salesforce and want to update your knowledge and get up to speed with the latest features, a very good way to do it is to use Trailhead, an interactive and intuitive learning tool provided by Salesforce to guide you through the process of learning about the Salesforce1 platform while having fun. Your achievements will be rewarded with points and badges.

There are now 30 modules, 7 trails and 6 projects available in Trailhead, aimed at both admins and developers, so you can choose the one that best suits your needs.

The latest Trailhead releases are the following:

- Admin Trail - CRM, with three modules
- Dreamforce Trail with Get Ready for Dreamforce module
- Event Monitoring

Out of the new content, today I will be focusing on the Event Monitoring module. I have recently been carrying on some investigations in one of the Salesforce orgs that I usually work on to find out who did something really dodgy on a trigger, and I find it fascinating all the things you can find out when you dig in a bit deeper, so doing the Trailhead module on Event Monitoring would help me become a better Salesforce Detective.

It takes about 45 minutes to finish the whole module, broken down into 15 minute blocks that you can follow as you find gaps through your day, or whenever you need a break from whatever you are doing. These are the three blocks for the Event Monitoring module, each of them can give you up to 100 points, a total of 300!

Get Started with Event Monitoring: This is an introduction to Event Monitoring, explaining what you can achieve with it and defining a few basic concepts. The way this block is structured makes you want to keep reading and it definitely catches your attention.

Query Event Log Files: This section drives you through one of the most useful tools in Salesforce, the Workbench, which allows you to inspect the Event Log Files in a very intuitive way.

Trailhead shows your module progress as you play along

Download and Visualize Event Log Files: This last block gives you details about how to download the Event Log Files and the format in which the files are generated, so that it becomes easy for the end user to read and understand the file's content.

So once you complete your module, you'll get your points and new modules are suggested to you. I encourage you to take on the different modules, even if you already know Salesforce, as it gives you other points of view and approaches you wouldn't have thought yourself...

I wish I could have used Trailhead when I first started learning Salesforce, it makes it a lot easier to learn, more in line with the online world we live in.

And if you are not sure how to get started with Trailhead, you can alwasy check for Salesforce User Groups in your area; you will always find someone there to ask for help or even organise a joint Trailhead session.

Thanks very much for reading this post, I hope you found it useful and enjoyed getting started with Trailhead.