It’s a myth that every admin should learn to code – Admin and “Adminoloper” skills are valuable specialties themselves. But just because you don’t code, doesn’t mean there aren’t things you can learn from the world of software development and apply to make your job easier and improve the performance and stability of your orgs. In this session, Dan Appleman, the author of Advanced Apex Programming, will show you how to adopt concepts from the world of software development into the admin world – without writing a single line of Apex or JavaScript.

1. Top 10 Things Admins Can Learn from Developers
(without learning to code)
DAN
APPLEMAN

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What do admins and developers do?
We solve problems and implement processes in Salesforce by customizing
metadata

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Yes, Code IS Metadata!

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What do admins and developers do?
We solve problems and implement processes in Salesforce by customizing
metadata
We all live in the same metadata

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Have you seen, heard of or experienced any of these?
• Someone changed something and broke something else.
• Fields that exist, but you don’t know why
• Workflows or processes that you don’t understand
• Try to deploy but unit tests are failing, and you don’t know why or when
they started failing
• Code on the org that exists but you don’t know what it does
• Try to figure out something you did a year ago and why?
• Can’t figure out who changed something, when and why.

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Declarative
• 20 years (but early years had less
complexity)
• Not much “formal” research
• How many admin+devs – 2 or 3
million success users, but we know
there are many duplicates…
Looking Back as an Admin

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Looking Back as a Software Developer
Software
• 73 years since ENIAC
• 25 million + software developers
• Extensive formal research
(professors, grad students,
corporate research, etc)

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We’re doing the same thing, but…
Declarative
• 20 years (but early years had less
complexity)
• Not much “formal” research
• How many admin+devs – 2 or 3
million success users, but we know
there are many duplicates…
Software
• 73 years since ENIAC
• 25 million + software developers
• Extensive formal research
(professors, grad students,
corporate research, etc)

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We’ve spent decades addressing these issues!
• Someone changed something and broke something else.
• Fields that exist, but you don’t know why
• Workflows or processes that you don’t understand
• Try to deploy but unit tests are failing, and you don’t know why or when
they started failing
• Code on the org that exists but you don’t know what it does
• Try to figure out something you did a year ago and why?
• Can’t figure out who changed something, when and why.

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Top 10 Things Admins Can Learn from Developers
(without learning to code)
• This isn’t about learning to code. Personally, I don’t think it makes sense
for admins to learn to code unless they love coding (reading code is
another matter).
• This is about taking the lessons of the software development word and
applying them to the admin/declarative world.

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#1 Application Lifecycle Cost
If you learn nothing else from this talk – learn this.

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Here’s how we do it…
Define the Requirements
Design the Solution
Implement the Solution
Test the Solution
Document the Solution
Maintain it over Time

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Here’s what it costs…
Define the Requirements
Design the Solution
Implement the Solution
Test the Solution
Document the Solution
Maintain it over Time 50-80%

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Maintenance is your largest cost
• May be even larger on SFDC
• Investing on faster coding is silly
• The practice of bringing in consultants to build stuff who then go away may
be a false economy – plan on a long-term relationship.
• Anything you do early in the project to reduce maintenance costs, is good.

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#2 Unit Tests Aren’t About Testing
They are about regression testing

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What is a Unit Test?
• It’s Apex code
• Its purpose is to test other code
• It does not change the state of the org

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Unit Tests
• They aren’t about the initial test – you’re going to do manual testing
anyway. They are about detecting when someone breaks something –
maintenance!!!!

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#3 Code Coverage Doesn’t Matter as much as you think

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Diminishing returns
• 100% code coverage means you’re probably wasting time
(with exceptions and trivialities)
• SFDC does code coverage because it’s the only thing you can measure!
• They need to actually test something (system asserts)

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Original Test
@istest
public static void TestLeadTriggerTest()
{
List<Lead> leads = [Select id, Status from Lead];
for(Lead ld: leads) ld.status = 'Working - Contacted’;
test.startTest();
update leads;
test.stopTest();
}

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Correct Test
@istest
public static void TestLeadTriggerTest()
{
List<Lead> leads = [Select id, Status from Lead];
for(Lead ld: leads) ld.status = 'Working - Contacted’;
test.startTest();
update leads;
test.stopTest();
List<Task> tasks =
[Select ID from Task where WhoId in :leads];
system.assertEquals(10, tasks.size());
}

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@future
public static void LeadStatusChanged(List<ID> leadIds)
{
List<Lead> leads = [Select ID, Name, Status from Lead where ID in :leadIds];
List<Task> tasks = new List<Task>();
for(Lead ld: leads)
{
if(ld.status == 'Working - Contacted')
{
tasks.add(new Task(Description = ld.Name + ' is now working',
WhoId = ld.Id // Was WhatId = ld.Id
));
}
}
if(tasks.size()>0)
{
try {
insert tasks;
} catch (Exception ex) {
system.debug('Exception occurred');
system.debug(ex.getMessage());
}
}

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#4 Test before Deployment
QA/Test orgs

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First the obvious
• Build on sandbox or scratch org, UAT org
• Run the unit tests
• Only then, deploy

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#5 Continuous Integration

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Automatic regression testing!
• The crazy super powerful techniques that you’ll be using in a few years…
• What you can do today

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#6 You Can Test More Than Code
You can even test declarative

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Apex code that tests a workflow
@istest
public class WorkingWorkflowTest {
static List<Lead> makeData(Integer daysOffset){
List<Lead> leads = new List<Lead>();
for(Integer x = 0; x<10; x++)
{
String leadname = 'ld' + string.valueOf(x);
leads.add(new Lead(FirstName = leadname, LastName = leadName,
Email = leadname + '@test.com’,
Company = leadname + 'company'));
}
insert leads;
for(Lead ld: leads)
Test.setCreatedDate(ld.id, DateTime.Now().addDays(daysOffset));
return leads;
}

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Apex code that tests a workflow
@istest
public static void testOldLeads()
{
List<Lead> leads = MakeData(-31);
for(Lead ld: leads) ld.status = 'Working - Contacted’;
test.startTest();
update leads;
test.stopTest();
List<Lead> updatedLeads = [Select Id, Status from Lead];
for(Lead ld: updatedLeads)
{
system.assertEquals('Working Harder', ld.status);
}
}

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Apex code that tests a workflow
@istest
public static void testNewerLeads()
{
List<Lead> leads = MakeData(-29);
for(Lead ld: leads) ld.status = 'Working - Contacted’;
test.startTest();
update leads;
test.stopTest();
List<Lead> updatedLeads = [Select Id, Status from Lead];
for(Lead ld: updatedLeads)
{
system.assertEquals('Working - Contacted', ld.status);
}
}
}

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#7 Source Control

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The bad old days
• Audit log
• Looking at modified dates
• Processes are better (supports versions)

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Salesforce DX – git with it!
• Build, pull, deploy
• Detailed history
• Why did someone make that change? Who made it? When?
• Meanwhile – pull and commit!

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#8 Project Management

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Check out Jira
• Tasks
• Explanations – history
• Tied to source control – so complete history

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Link to docs!
Link to code
changes
Comments below

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#9 Comments Matter

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Comments in formulas
• Add comments to formulas!
• Doesn’t count against compiled limit

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#10 Formulas are Code
Maybe it should be taught like it

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Learning Core Concepts
• If only the earth were flat…
• Boolean Algebra – you’re using it even if you don’t realize it
(wouldn’t you like to use it better)?

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Have you seen, heard of or experienced any of these?
• Someone changed something and broke something else. (Unit tests)
• Fields that exist, but you don’t know why (In git)
• Workflows or processes that you don’t understand
(Comments, git and Jira)
• Try to deploy but unit tests are failing, and you don’t know why or when
they started failing (SFDX, Continuous Integration)
• Code on the org that exists but you don’t know what it does (git & Jira)
• Try to figure out something you did a year ago and why? (git & Jira)
• Can’t figure out who changed something, when and why. (git & Jira)

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Join us for drinks
@18:00 sponsored
by
Community sponsors:
Thank you!
Dan Appleman
@danappleman
dan@desawarepublishing.com
http://advancedapex.com
http://advancedapex.com/testtracker
NonProfit-track sponsor: