There are two types of Salesforce developers. The first type is the Most Valuable Developer or MVD for short. They are trailblazers obsessed with coding and are up-to-date on the coolest development strategies that help build intelligent CRM tools. MVD’s enjoy operating in the universe of orgs, speaking the special metadata language, and coding in Apex.
A second type is a group of developers smart enough
to get the job done, but may not be aware of the latest
development best practices – they may even be bored
out of their minds after doing repetitive tasks manually.
Would you like to join the first type of Salesforce
developers or MVD’s and make a difference?
Here are 5 best practices that can help get you there:
1 )Integrate your Code Regularly
Even with the best planning, it’s still necessary to improvise to solve unexpected problems when coding. That’s why the practice of continuous integration (code that’s regularly integrated into a shared version control repository) is so important with modern coding techniques. The continuous integration mechanism automates the process of unit testing and can achieve 75-90% code coverage without human intervention.
2) Create and Test in Scratch Orgs
MVD’s tend to be creative, yet do not want their experiments to get in the
way of application development. They can spin up a scratch org quickly, work on functionality, test, integrate code into the version control repository and finally, delete the org. Scratch orgs are perfect, configurable, and short-term Salesforce development environments that drive productivity, and facilitate testing automation and continuous integration.
3) Deploy Deltas to Avoid Hitting the Governor Limits
Deployments are a big deal in Salesforce development projects. Although there are valid reasons for that reputation, we strongly disagree. When deploying applications, teams are restricted to a file size of 39MB, which is applicable to all kinds of deployment tools such as changesets, metadata API, Force.com IDE, and ANT migration tools. By deploying the changes (delta) of the metadata components, delta-based deployments are fast, robust, and error-free.
4) Develop ‘Intelligently’
While coding does require good instincts, you can’t solely rely on them. Developers can end up being either off the mark or completely wrong by using instinct alone. That’s why it’s important for developers to use metrics to make informed decisions. For example, information on apex test failures, code coverage, PMD, and deployment status can help improve the quality and pace of the development cycle. Continuous integration tools will provide these types of statistics and offer additional insights.
5) Schedule Data Loads
How many manual data migrations have you done today? This week? This month? Now ask yourself how many of those migrations were useful when comparing it to the functionality you could’ve built at the same time. Manual data migration is a time-suck and error-prone endeavor. Scheduling data loads, such as a nightly import, not only eliminates the pain of data migration but also makes way for better resource utilization and cost savings. You might be thinking, what about IDs or parent-child relationships? Don’t we need to do VLOOKUP anymore? By making sure your data-loading solution understands your complex metadata, circular references, and parent-child relationships, is a straightforward task.
Summary
There you have it, 5 best practices that help bridge the gap to become better Salesforce developers. The time and effort required to integrate these best practices into development workflows are huge. But why would you want to pursue it? It’s simple– every best practice you implement means a quantifiable reduction in time and effort.
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