Salesforce Platform App Builder Exam Prep and Experience (Part - 1)

Salesforce has changed by leaps and bounds from where I have started on Salesforce with my first implementation in 2008 (both configuration, customization wise and as a platform). After a 2 years of intermittent hands-on on Salesforce, I felt the best way to come back is via this post. I recently joined the full time work force and back to continuing my Salesforce journey after my MBA.

This has been a much requested post, as soon as I have updated my profile on Linkedin I got requests for “Dumps” a fool proof way of clearing any SFDC certification. I admit that I myself have resorted to flash cards during my initial times. In my preparations for various certifications, a prominent realization was that it is the orientation and in depth exposure to all topics and the hands on that “A particular exam” demands for that matters. Also the key is to go that extra mile to “know beyond general behaviors” of the tool (salesforce), because we all know the general behaviors already. Once we are familiar with the topics outlined in the Exam guide, we can be rest assured that we will pass the exam.

Let’s get straight into the exam preparation and my experience. I am going to outline the prep based on the transition guide and topics outlined.

1. Salesforce AppExchange Overview Demo is a good start to understand what AppExchange can offer.
There was one scenario based question on when does an organization prefer to purchase an AppExchange tool in opposition to organic development (in-house customization).

2. Record Types: There is prominence of record types in Business Processes like “Sales Process”, “Support Process” that they create a level of abstraction to users belonging to various groups in the organization. Pay special attention to scenarios like, what happens when a value is added to master Picklist, do we add the new values manually to the existing records types etc.

I personally benefited from this resource: Read the tips as well in the document.  Cheatsheet (there were 2 questions in scenario format)

3. Rollup Summary Field: There were around 2 questions on what is the kind of relationship that allows Rollup Summary field type in a scenario based format. Please concentrate on the “Management” Section.

Out of the 2 questions, one was a very poorly worded question that revolves around: A parent object and a detailed object. There are detailed records created daily, but the question reads that the parent record is created once a month using Apex and says the parent summarizes the detailed records at the beginning of the month when the parent record is created via Apex. Unfortunately I felt this was unfair question since none of the options supported the Apex related Parent Child relationship behavior. But ultimately only answer that could satisfy Rollup behavior – summarization behavior was Master Detailed relationship (To know more about this question please leave a comment, so I can share details)

4.  Field Update Considerations: This is by far a topic I enjoyed seeing in the exam. The questions were surely food for brain. The take home for me was the fact that a Field Update results cannot trigger any of the rules such as Validation rules, Assignment rules, Auto Response and Escalation Rules. There were around 2 questions which revolved around these concepts.

Pay close attention to how Field updates on the Approvals behave and also how the field updates on workflow behave. Can Approval Processes support “Cross-Object” formula field updates? Scenarios that would just ignore field updates, but would not explicitly error out and abort the processes/automations.

How would a validation rule behave in conjunction to field updates? If there is a conflict between field update and validation rule, i.e. the workflow field update has updated a field in such a way that it violated the validation rule what would happen?

I found the documentation more than enough for the exam. Concentrate on the section “Field Update Limitations”.

Follow the following links:

https://help.salesforce.com/HTViewHelpDoc?id=workflow_defining_field_updates.htm&language=en_US

https://help.salesforce.com/HTViewHelpDoc?id=workflow_cross_object_field_updates.htm&language=en_US

https://help.salesforce.com/HTViewHelpDoc?id=workflow_field_updates_reevalute_wf.htm&language=en_US

5. Social Accounts, Contacts and Leads: I would suggest you to setup the feature in your dev org and try out once. This is a very basic topic and saw one question on this topic. The take home points for me were that every employee in the salesforce organization needs to have their own social media account to view the particular Account / Contact / Lead details and the level of visibility of details depend on how you are connected to these records (accounts/contacts/lead). LinkedIn support is withdrawn going forward so please note that.

6. External Objects: This topic needs much attention. I do not exactly recollect how many questions I have seen from this topic (may be 2). The questions were not essentially around basic knowledge of External objects, but were more scenario based questions. Pay close attention to the following topics: https://help.salesforce.com/apex/HTViewHelpDoc?id=external_object_relationships.htm&language=en_US

Go in depth into each relationship type. The documentation would suffice w.r.t the examination. The examples outlined were very well written. (Ex: How do we show external invoice records on Account detailed page etc.) What fields can be created on an External Object? How do we sync data into the External Objects?

7. Lightening App: There was only two question as far as my memory goes. The question asked for what kind of components can be added via lightening App builder, more scenario based.

Any reason why we cannot add a Visualforce page to the Home page in the lightening?

The video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qm_kQFfRIaY&feature=youtu.be is a good place to start. Follow the Trailhead because it is more than sufficient. Admin Trail - Migrating to Lightning Experience (Trailhead Lightening Migration)

Hope this part of the post helps you guys with the preparation for Platform App builder Transition exam. I will cover rest of the topics in the next post in the coming days.

Please feel free to leave a comment in case you have a specific question regarding any of the topics covered.

Experience: My experience in studying each of the topics in depth was very interesting. When I took the exam I felt it was one of the easiest exams I have taken and expected that Transition exam would be much tougher. This is strictly my personal opinion, the reason I say this is one of my friends who took the exam same day felt it was a little tougher. So the salesforce exams completely depend on the hands-on and preparation before you visit the exam center.