I’ve started traveling the country talking to Salesforce Developers and User Groups. Salesforce is in an interesting transition from great product to full-fledged Enterprise Platform. This is a great opportunity for ISV’s and Salesforce Administrators alike to build some insanely great new applications that leverage these new capabilities. Everybody is curious about the role of Salesforce DX, and how we used Salesforce DX to supercharge Snapshot 2.0 Change and Release Management.
My talk starts with a discussion about the platform transition at Salesforce, and the role of Salesforce DX. Next, I show some command line examples about how to create a Scratch Org and Push and Pull source from a Developer Project. Many of the new SFDX capabilities were used to create Snapshot as well. Developer Projects can be downloaded from any repository, the files can be harvested, and then turned into a snapshot. Scratch Orgs and Dev Hubs can be connected to your Snapshot Workflow. Support for Second-Generation Packages is on the way, and Developer Controlled Packages can be pushed between Orgs.
Boston Salesforce Developers Group
Salesforce DX: Quick Start, App Development Model, and Continuous Integration
Our intrepid host, Bing Wang, taught a hands-on developer workshop all about using the Salesforce DX Command Line. He covered the lion’s share of Salesforce DX capabilities in just about an hour. After that, I spoke about how we used Salesforce DX to connect Source-Driven Development to the Change and Release Process. Thanks for the invitation Boston! We’ll see you guys again at DreamForce this year.
Kansas City Salesforce User Group
Next up I visited the Kansas City Salesforce User Group. The audience consisted of Salesforce Administrators, Salesforce Developers, and Power Users. The Kansas City area has a thriving Salesforce community, and this was great to see in person. Our host Dale Zeigler led a lively and wide-ranging discussion about many aspects of Salesforce development. My talk was well received, and there were quite a few questions about how we used Salesforce DX for application development and Change and Release Management.
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PRESENTATION
Salesforce is at an inflection point moving from application to platform. This is a great opportunity for ISV developers who want to build new products and enterprise architects who want to tackle new initiatives. Salesforce DX is a key part of this strategy, providing a source-driven programming environment and better organization of developer projects with second-generation packages.
Bill Appleton wrote the first AppExchange application DreamTeam in 2005, and one of the most popular administrative tools Snapshot in 2006. Now working on Snapshot 2.0, Bill will show how he used Salesforce DX to harvest developer repositories and allow administrators to create scratch orgs on the fly. Working together, Snapshot and Salesforce DX connect developer projects to the change and release management process.
BIOGRAPHY
Bill Appleton is a leading expert on the use of web services for smart client applications. He has designed and written approximately three dozen professional software publications, including the first rich media authoring tool World Builder in 1984, the ground breaking multimedia programming language SuperCard in 1989, the worldwide best selling CD-ROM Titanic in 1996, the first AppExchange application DreamTeam in 2005, and the first API Automation Platform DreamFactory in 2010, and Snapshot 2.0 Change and Release Management for Salesforce in 2018.
Bill previously served as the President of the gaming company CyberFlix where he worked closely with Disney, Paramount, Viacom, and Bandai. After that, he was the President of DreamFactory Software, which developed an open source REST API platform for HTML5 and native mobile applications. Currently, he is the CTO at Metazoa building the world’s best change and release management application for the Salesforce ecosystem. Many leading computer publications and mainstream magazines have featured Bill’s work, including People Magazine, Newsweek, and US News and World Report.
Specialties: web services, authoring tools, smart clients
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