Platform Events provide a means to send notifications from your code without fear of rollback, making them an ideal means to communicate diagnostics about your code. Apply Platform Events with worked examples to enhance your logging skills while making it easier to diagnose issues without debug logs! The session will include a small library and Lightning Component to monitor log output real time!

1. Advanced Logging Patterns with
Platform Events
@andyinthecloud
Andrew Fawcett, CTO, FinancialForce

2. Andrew Fawcett
CTO, FinancialForce
Blogger, Author, Salesforce MVP
Customer or
Salesforce Logo

3. About FinancialForce
SF+FF Solutions 700+
Financial Management,
Professional Services Automation,
Billing Central, & Revenue
Recognition & Forecasting
1,400+ 40% YoY $110M
#1 Cloud ERP on Salesforce
The largest Salesforce partner
Employees across 7 offices
HQ in San Francisco, CA
Subscription revenue growthCustomers in 34+ countries
With users in 50+ countries
Run rate
20% investment from Salesforce
Plus investments from TCV & Unit 4
3

4. Logging Requirements
Flexibility, easy of use, analytics, security and efficiency

5. Logging Requirements
Flexibility
• Ability to log any arbitrary text and reportable information (e.g. resource usage)
Easy to use
• Low touch for developers, simple but powerful, should not clutter code
Analytics and Active Monitoring
• Ability for developers and admins to view (ideally live) and derive actions from
Security
• Logged results should be controlled by security constraints
Efficiency
• All logging will add some overhead, but should be kept to minimal
Flexibility, easy of use, analytics, security and efficiency

6. Brief Introduction to Platform Events
What? Why? Creating them, sending and receiving them!

7. Introduction to Platform Events
What is an “Event” ?
• A “message” to be shared to one or more interested parties
What are they? Use cases?
Roger Mitchell
Cofounder @BluestoneLabsIO
“it’s like Twitter
and IFTTT
together”
“making part of the
work easier to
customize and adapt to
a specific biz process
across multiple orgs &
depts”
Bonny Hinners
Founder at RealtelephonyEvent
Process A
Message
Send
Process B
Process C
Message
Send
Use cases?
•Respond to activity occurring in the outside world, such as
device status or other platforms (Heroku)
•Differ work into the background to improve page response times
•Send and receive telemetry from your Apex/PB/Flow processes
for realtime and retrospective monitoring and review

8. Introduction to Platform Events
Creating Platform Events
• Created via Setup, MD API, IDE etc
• Fields define the content of the message / event
Send and Receiving
•Lots API’s available on and off platform
•Tools such as Process Builder and Flow #clicksnotcode
Creating them, sending and receiving them

9. Logging with Platform Events
Realtime, capturable and actionable

10. Advanced Logging with Platform Events
Flexibility
• Multiple log listeners to filter and forward log events, e.g. recording logs
Easy to use
• Sent and received on multiple platforms, languages and tools
Analytics and Active Monitoring
• Monitored live via CometD streaming libraries, no polling!
• Can contain text and numeric data values for filtering and reporting
Security
• Controlled via standard Profile and Permission Sets
Efficiency
•Low impact on executing process / code, outside transaction
Requirements checklist
✔
✔
✔
✔
✔

11. Advanced Logging with Platform Events
Configure access
• Permission Sets can be used to
control who sends (create) and who
receives (read) log events
Careful what you log!
• Despite the security controls, be
careful what you log
•No, guarantees where data ends up
•No, session Id’s
•No, record data, think privacy
Security considerations

12. Introducing Platform Event Logging
Platform agnostic sending, capture and monitoring

13. Apex Language
•Send via EventBus.publish method
•Receive via Trigger
Advanced Logging with Platform Events
Sending and receiving log events
Salesforce API’s
•Send via record insert into event object
•Receive via CometD API
• Various libraries for Java, JavaScript etc..
Lightning Components
•Receive via Streaming Component
•Wraps CometD JavaScript API

14. Demo
Sending via Salesforce REST API (Salesforce Workbench)
Receiving via Streaming Lightning Component

15. Advanced Logging with Platform Events
Sending and receiving log events
Process Builder
•Send via record insert into event object
•Receiving, must map event data to an
existing Standard/Custom object record
Flow
•Send via record insert into event object
•Use Wait element to wait for messages
and filter them with criteria

16. Logging in Apex
Generating log events from Apex

17. Logging in Apex
Features
• Supports nested / scoped logging
• Buffers in memory
• Automatically records limits usage
• Useful for profiling Apex code
Log Class
2017-10-22 21:03:50.177
1:MyClass.methodA (DML 2,SQL 2)
2:MyClass.methodB (DML 1)
3:Doing something
2:MyClass.methodC (SQL 1)
2:Doing something else

18. Demo
Logging via the Log class

19. Monitoring Logs via Lightning
Logging Lightning Component

20. Log Viewer Lightning Component
Lightning Features used
• Lightning Base Component (lightning:tree)
•Lightning Streaming Component (c:streaming)
• Lightning Utility Bar displays logs real time while using the app
• Lightning Record Page Component (when displaying recorded logs)
•Lightning Data Services (lightning:recordData)
Parses the Log Event data and displays via Lightning Tree Component

21. Called by Apply Discount button
• Add to Service class
•OpportunitiesService.applyDiscounts
• Add to Domain class
•Opportunties.applyDiscounts
•OpportunityLines.applyDiscounts
• Add to Unit of Work class
•fflib_SObjectUnitOfWork.commitWork
Profiling Apex Code with the Log Class
via the Apex Enterprise Patterns Sample App

22. Demo
Monitoring Logs within Lightning Experience

23. Filtering and Capturing Log Events
With Process Builder

24. Capturing Log Events with Process Builder
Create a process that starts when a platform event occurs!

25. Capturing Log Events with Process Builder
Process Builder Receives Events and Filters them
• Using the Wait Element
• Filter criteria example …
“capture log events if more than 1 SOQL statement is used
when executing applying discounts logic”
Applying filter criteria
TIP: Events need to be mapped to a record in Process Builder. You can use the User record if you
don’t have an existing record (as is the case here).

26. Capturing Log Events with Process Builder
Log Recording custom object
is used to captured logs via Create a Record
• Record level Lightning Component displays
formatted log output
• Note assignment of OwnerId field (optional)
Displaying recorded logs

27. Demo
Filtering and Capturing Logs with Flow

28. Wrap up
Summary and Resources

29. Resources
Documentation
•Lightning Developer Guide
•Platform Events Developer Guide
Blog
• http://andyinthecloud.com
Demo Code
•https://github.com/afawcett/eventlogging
Documentation, Blog and Demo Code

30. Q&A