Download excel with multiple sheets in visualforce page

In this blogpost, i am going to share how to export an excel from visualforce page with multiple sheets in it.

renderAs attribute in the <apex:page> component gives you flexibility to download a visualforce page's output in pdf or xls. In this case, we will use XLS by using following code:

By using renderAs = text/xml, we will get the vf page output as excel, that means we can use excel's code to make Excel compiler understand its syntax. Excel understands data in XML form, so we are going to create XML for excel to understand. 

 - The first thing we have to use is xlsHeader, which is a string that i am setting in controller just so that i can use it in my page. you can hard-code it in the page as well. This should be the first element in your page. This contains the first element of any XML file which is <xml> (similar to <apex:page> in vf page)

  

- The 2nd thing to note is the excel works in workbooks. one instance of excel is one workbook. One workbook may have multiple tabs/sheets, whatever you call it, but it should all belong to one workbook. So after my header, i am defining <workbook> component

What comes after workbook is <styles> tag, which as name suggests is similar to css classes. in this example, i am defining a style with the ID ="s1", which tells that text should be in bold and the formatting will be numerical, alignment will on top. Very similar to css classes.

- After that we have the main area, which is called worksheets or tabs in excel. Excel calls them worksheets. So every worksheet will have a name which is defined in the attribute "ss:Name". in our case Accounts & Contacts. 

- After worksheets, we have <table> which defines a table and <rows> which defines a row. In every row we have <cells> and every cell has <data> in it. 

- you can add style to any cell by using <cell ss:StyleId ="classname">, which will apply the style defined in that style tag, as defined before and you can type to any data by using ss:Type, which is like "Format Cell" option in excel UI.

- in this example, i have created 2 worksheets, one for Account & other for Contacts.

Code is available at github

Using reports to create dynamic columns in pageBlock Table

This is 3rd series from the blogpost where i was explaining how we can show data in visualforce pages with the flexibility for the client/admin to change the fields to display on the page without changing the source code. In this example i am using Reports.

In this example, i am leveraging Salesforce's ReportManager class, which has the flexibility to run reports synchronously and async as well. I am going to use async method in this demonstration, but you can also use async methods, description here.

The source code is available at GitHub.

The code is very simple, all you need is reportId. You can hard-code in your class like i did, or you can also pass it as a parameter in the page. If you want to make it more dynamic, you can query reports from your org and show the report names as select options.

 public ID reportId {get;set;}
    public Reports.ReportResults reportResults{get;set;}
    
    public RG_getDynamicColumnsViaReports(){
        reportId='00O90000009S7X5'; //i am hard-coding the id here, but you can also pass it to parameter in page or query it
        runReport();
    }
    
    public void runReport(){
         
        reportResults = Reports.ReportManager.runReport(reportId, true);
    }

If you notice in the code above, all i am doing is running the report using ReportManager's runReport method. That is all you need. It will return the list of Reports.ReportResults class, which contains all your data.

Page:

<apex:page controller="RG_getDynamicColumnsViaReports" sidebar="false">
    <apex:includeScript value="{!URLFOR($Resource.dataTable, 'js/jquery.js')}"/>
<apex:includeScript value="{!URLFOR($Resource.dataTable, 'js/jquery.dataTables.min.js')}"/>
<apex:stylesheet value="{!URLFOR($Resource.dataTable, 'css/jquery.dataTables.css')}"/>
    <apex:form >
        
        <apex:pageBlock >
           
            <table id="outtable" class="reportResults">
           <thead>
               <apex:repeat value="{!reportResults.reportMetadata.detailColumns}" var="colName">
                   <th><apex:outputText value="{!reportResults.reportExtendedMetadata.detailColumnInfo[colName].label}"/></th>
               </apex:repeat>
           </thead>

           <tbody>
               <apex:repeat value="{!reportResults.factMap['T!T'].rows}" var="row">
                   <tr>
                       <apex:repeat value="{!row.dataCells}" var="cell">
                           <td><apex:outputText value="{!cell.label}"/></td>
                       </apex:repeat>
                   </tr>
               </apex:repeat>
           </tbody>
         </table>
        </apex:pageBlock>
    </apex:form>
<script>
    //to make the table UI look nice, i am using datatables.js
    j$ = jQuery.noConflict();
            j$(document).ready( function () {
                var outTable = j$('[id$="outtable"]').DataTable({
                    
                });
            });
</script>
</apex:page>


I have used 2 repeats here in the page. One for iterating in the reportExtendedMetadata to get header labels and 2nd for getting row data, which is being stored in factMap class of exportResults. 

Here is the output:

Using listViews to create dynamic columns in PageBlock in visualForce page

This is 2nd post from the blogpost that explains how can a developer creates a visualforce page with the flexibility for the client or admin to change fields by themselves without involving a developer. In my previous post, i explained about using field sets to do the same. In this post, i will explain another way i.e. using list views from the object.

In this approach, we can create custom list views on the object and use that list view to get all the fields used in the list view and display them in the visualforce page

Here is what you need to do that:
1) Enable rest API urls in remote Site Settings. Since listView method is only available in rest API, we need to do a callout to get the listView details.

2) In the controller, we will do the callout. I have hard-coded 2 parameters for this example, but you can make them dynamic as per your requirement
     a) objectApiName - This will store the API name of the object which you                need to query
     b) listViewId - This is the Salesforce id of the list view. you can query                    it(shown in the code as commented), or you can find it from the list view            URL (it starts with 00B), image below:

3) In the controller, i am getting 2 things from the response
    a) Query parameter - that contains the whole query from list view. YES,                 salesforce creates a query for you automatically
    b) Columns to Display - in the response, we have columns parameters, that           contains api name of the fields used in the listView. This will be used to             show the columns from the query. You can also split the columns name             from 1st parameter(query)

4) That is it, rest of the things are pretty obvious. A vf page to display the query     results in page block table.
SOURCE CODE AVAILABLE AT : gitHub

Output :

How to be an expert and get your dream job in salesforce in less than 5 months

Salesforce is a hot product and has changed a lot in last few years. Back in 2010, when I started working on this platform, very few people in India were aware about it. But now, almost every IT company knows about Salesforce and want to have some good resources on the same technology. Also, since new customers are joining Salesforce every single day, that means demands for Salesforce Admin, Developer & consultant are increasing.

It is not very difficult to become an expert in salesforce, but it requires some patience and dedication. In this blog, I am going to share few steps to become a salesforce expert, which I have learnt from my experience of 7 years in salesforce. If you follow these steps, you will get a good paying job in salesforce technology.

1)      Register a DEV ORG for your practice

Anyone interested in learning salesforce must have a DEV account in order to play around the platform. This is life-time free of cost salesforce instance that allows you to learn and practice things.

With this org, you can do following things:

a)       Build new features and functionalities (like Custom app, fields, validation rules, security settings)

b)      Create and execute APEX Code & visualforce pages (If you are developer)

c)       Access the salesforce community (http://developer.force.com/)  to get hands on never-ending supply of salesforce documentations, produced by salesforce & the community.

You can also register for various salesforce training sessions using this credentials in this community.

d)      Create packages for your code for appexhange.

e)      Installing packages created by other companies from appexchange.

f)        And much more…

2)      Learn, Practice, Learn, Practice….

Once your dev account is created, its time to get started on practicing your learnings on this account. There are various resources that can help to get started on learning salesforce, few of them are:

a)       Salesforce Fundamental PDF – This pdf is very good starting point to learn salesforce. This pdf will help you create a Recruiting app with the help of examples and easy walkthroughs.  Make sure you implement all the exercises that you learn in this pdf.

b)      Salesforce Trailhead – trailhead.salesforce.com is an interactive learning tool developed & maintained by Salesforce. Its very similar to Code Academy in that it has modules  you’ll work through using your admin org. Along the way, you’ll learn the basics of Salesforce while earning points and badges. It’s phenomenal (and totally free).

c)       Salesforce YouTube Channel— This is also a very great resource of learning salesforce from various videos uploaded by Salesforce.

3)      Join a meetup group and start networking – There are over 200 user groups around the world that allows you to meet, learn and make some networking with other local salesforce talent. Try to meet other people and learn from their experiences. Bigger network you have, easier it would be to get a job.

4)      Be Active on social networking Sites – Salesforce groups are there in almost every networking website like Linkedin or Facebook. Be a member of them to keep updated on what is happening, what new is coming. Also become friends with various salesforce talent around the globe. Follow people and blogs that are interesting to you. I have learned a lot from following blogs from various salesforce experts like Bob Buzzard and Ankit Arora.

5)      Volunteer – Once you get hold of salesforce customizations(for developers) and configurations, I would advise you to be part of salesforce developer forums and start contributing in them. Some of the good salesforce communities are:

a)      Salesforce Developer forums : https://developer.salesforce.com/forums/

b)      Stackexchange : http://salesforce.stackexchange.com/

Be part of these forums. See what are the issues other people are getting. Try to help them with replying the solutions to them. That way, you will learn real-time issues that any book can not teach you.

I hope this help you guys to get started on salesforce. Happy learning. I am looking forward to meet you guys in salesforce communities. Any questions you have, feel free to reach me at rohit@applikontech.com and I will try my best to answer those questions as soon as possible.