Wizard's Apprentice

Video Training Series

 Flow Orchestrator Build – Live
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Flow Orchestrator Build – Live

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Salesforce Flow Orchestrator was Generally Available as part of the Spring ’22 release. Flow Orchestrator isn’t fully documented out yet and I’ve found a few “gotchas” as I started to build these for my customers at Better Partners. So I decided to do a live-stream build.

What is Flow Orchestrator

Flow Orchestrator is basically a meta-flow. It is built in the Lightning Flow Builder and has components to call other Flows organized as Steps in Stages as well as Decision logic elements. Flow Orchestrator is a great solution for business processes where the “work” is being passed back and forth between people or departments. It can be use as an alternative to Salesforce Approval Processes, especially for approvals with complex logic and approval trees.

Flow Orchestrator is a fairly simple feature that can have complex and big impacts. There’s a few things to consider when building an Orchestration.

Flow Orchestrator Considerations

There is one big consideration before you start building an Orchestration. Plan, plan, plan, and plan. Flow Orchestrator uses other activated Flows. This means these Flows already need to be built and active before you start your Orchestration.

Other of considerations:

  • Enterprise+ Editions have 600 Orchestrations per year as part of your Sales/service cloud license for each org. More than 600 runs has a cost. Estimate how often your Orchestration needs to run and contact your Salesforce AE if you need more than your 600 limit each year.
  • An Orchestration step can be assigned to a single User, a Public Group, or a Queue. Users only see something in the work guide if they have been assigned a step
  • Flow Orchestration steps have to be assigned to a record. This is the record id that will show the Orchestration work guide to the assigned user. This means any user assigned to the step needs to have access to the record to see the step assigned to them

Flow Orchestrator Lessons Learned

Other than planning and having all your Flows built ahead of time. Here’s some general things I’ve learned about building a Flow Orchestration.

  • Orchestrations have stages, with steps. A step is a Flow. An Orchestration can also have a decision element. Anything Resource other than the triggering record can be set from value output variables of Flows called in a step
  • Orchestration Steps can be either assigned to a user or can be run in the background.
  • Orchestration Steps assigned to users are screen flows
  • When assigning an Orchestration step:
    • User Resource= Username
    • Queue Resource = API Developer name of the queue
    • Group Resource = Group Name (API developer name_ of the Public Group
  • Background steps call an Autolaunch Flow and are useful for updating records, getting data & returning that data to the Orchestration as an Output Resource
  • Interactive Steps screen flows assigned to users require a Resource available for output to store any Screen component fields. For example, a Radio button on the screen cannot be available as an output. A Resource variable that gets assigned or uses the screen component as a default must be used.
  • Orchestrations steps can be started when the Stage “starts,” when a different Step finishes, or when a different Flow returns True

Flow Orchestrator Live Build

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New Flow Features in Spring 20

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New Flow Features in Spring 20

The Spring 20 release is coming to most Salesforce customers on February 15.
It’s one of the three annual releases put out by Salesforce. This release there’s some really big improvements coming to the Flow automation system. This video I’ll show off some of the ones I’m looking forward to using. It’s not every Flow feature so I recommend checking out the release notes

The Spring 20 Flow features I cover include:

That’s not everything by a long shot. Here’s a list of some of the other features for Flow in Spring ’20 that are not covered in the video.

 

Looking for more release stuff? Make sure you check out my podcast with Senior Directors of Product Management of Flow Shannon Hale & Jasson Teller. Plus, the WizardCast will be doing its release overview soon. I also suggest you check out this great site from Jen W Lee

Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Im4KcWogkV8

Check out other Wizard’s Apprentice videos:

 

Lightning Flow Builder: Resources! Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 4

 

Wizard’s Apprentice: Lightning Flow Builder Overview

 

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 Lightning Flow Builder: Your First Flow – Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 5
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Lightning Flow Builder: Your First Flow – Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 5

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Lightning Flow Builder: Your First Flow – Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 5

Welcome to episode 5! Ready to build your first Flow?

We’re going to put together all the lessons from the previous 4 episodes.

In episode 1, we did an overview of the Lightning Flow Builder and toured the tool. Episode 2 we learned about the Screen element and how we can use it to display information and ask for inputs from users. In episode 3 we reviewed how we can create different pathways and add logic by using the Decision element. In our last episode, we learned about Resources and how they are used to store information, records, and more.

The first four episodes set the foundation for building our first Flow.

We’re going to build something fun. Do you remember the Choose Your Own Adventure storybooks? In these books, every few pages you are presented with a choice to make. Depending on the choice you made, you are directed to a different page number in the book. When you think about it, this is nothing more than some text, choices, and evaluating which choice was selected. It sounds like a screen, choice resources, and decision elements in Lightning Flow Builder to me!

Feel free to build your own adventure. For this video, I took some short cuts in the length of text and type of choices. This was partly to keep the video shorter, but also to focus on the design of the Flow. You can make your adventure as elaborate or as simple as you want.

Once your adventure is built, you can use the debugger to walk through and experience your very own Choose Your Adventure within Salesforce.

Tell me what type of adventure you built! Leave me a comment and let me know what happens when someone chooses your adventure.

Video

This series of Wizard’s Apprentice will focus on a gradual review of the Lightning Flow Builder and Flow concepts to help make you be an automation wizard! Make sure you’ve watched our Lightning Flow Builder Overview episode since this expands what was already covered.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17yEOYsnKY8

Check out other Wizard’s Apprentice videos:

 

Lightning Flow Builder: Resources! Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 4

 

Wizard’s Apprentice: Lightning Flow Builder Overview

 

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7 Winter ’20 Lightning Flow Builder Features

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Lightning Flow Builder – Winter ’20

Salesforce Winter ’20 release is nearly upon us! The release notes are over 500 pages long this time around and it’s very likely you’ve may have missed some really cool updates. There are a number of updates coming to Flow, including some long-waited features. Winter ’20 is being released to some orgs September 20, and to the majority of Salesforce customers October 12 – check status.salesforce.com for the details on your org.

I have 7 Winter ’20 Flow updates that I’m really interested in. I haven’t made up my mind about one of them and I discuss why in the video. They other six features either add functionality back that was in the old Cloud Designer, or are net-new and AWESOME to the Lightning Flow Builder. Seriously, awesome.  They’re so awesome, it makes me want to sing praises to Shannon Hale. She’ll have to settle for her theme song.

There’s a lot in the release notes, so if you want more coverage, stay tuned for the Winter ’20 Overview podcast episode of the WizardCast. Estimated episode release is September 23, 2019

7 Winter ’20 Flow Features

  1. Schedule Flows – Autolaunch (no screen) flows only
  2. New Resource auto-populate
  3. Conditional Visibility on a Flow Screen
  4. Lookup Component for Screens
  5. Text Templates are now Rich Text
  6. Panning & Multi-Select
  7. Auto-Create Record Variables when adding Get Record element

This by far isn’t all the features coming out in the Winter ’20 release. I highly recommend you check out the release notes. You can also check out the post from Unofficial Flow site that provides a blog post overview.

Video

This series of Wizard’s Apprentice will focus on a gradual review of the Lightning Flow Builder and Flow concepts to help make you be an automation wizard! Make sure you’ve watched our Lightning Flow Builder Overview episode since this expands what was already covered.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7zChxlMQp4

Check out other Wizard’s Apprentice videos:

Decision Flows:

Lightning Flow Builder: Decision Element! Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 3

Lightning Flow Builder Screen Flows Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 2

 

Wizard’s Apprentice Lightning Experience – Sobject Variables, Collections & Loops Revisted

 

Wizard’s Apprentice: Lightning Flow Builder Overview

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Lightning Flow Builder: Resources! Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 4

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Lightning Flow Builder – Resources

Flow Resources are where we store information and provide potential values. There are 8 different types of resources we can use within our Flows. It is possible to create and use a Flow without using any resources, but the majority of the Flows you will create will be using resources.

Resources can be confusing for people. Some of the terms used are unfamiliar to Admins who have never had any programming or code exposure.  This Lightning Flow example, we look at the different resources you can create. You’ll learn about the different data types, how resources are used, and just exactly what “variable” means.

Flow Resources Type

  1. Variable – Data that can change during your Flow. Can be any Available Data Type. Most common are Text, Numbers, Dates, and Records. This can be a single value or a list of values. For example, multiple Accounts or just 1 account.
  2. Constant – Data that does not change during your Flow. Can be Text, Number, Currency, Date, and Boolean (True/False)
  3. Formula – Create a Formula similar to a Custom Field Formula. Functions from Field Formulas work here. Supports Text, Number, Currency, Date, Date/Time, and Boolean.
  4. Text Template – Provides a nice way to combine other resources and free text to create a text block. Think Chatter post
  5. Choices – A single value used on a screen for custom radio buttons, checkboxes, picklsits
  6. Record Set Choices – A list of potential choice values based on currently existing record data. Example, list of phone numbers of Accounts that are customers
  7. Picklist – The values in a Picklist Field

Flow Data Types

  1. Text – String or Text. IDs, states, typed answers that are not just numbers, dollars, or dates
  2. Record – Salesforce data! Accounts, Contacts, Opportunities, Custom Objects.
  3. Number – A valid number. Doesn’t included preceding zeros. Can have decimals
  4. Currency – Money!
  5. Boolean – True or False. Think checkbox
  6. Date – Just a date. For example 9/4/2019
  7. Date/Time – A date with a time. For example 9/4/2019 at 12:00 PM
  8. Picklist – Picklist Values
  9. Multi-Select Picklist – Values for Multi-Select picklists
  10. Apex-Defined – Defined by Apex Code

Video

This series of Wizard’s Apprentice will focus on a gradual review of the Lightning Flow Builder and Flow concepts to help make you be an automation wizard! Make sure you’ve watched our Lightning Flow Builder Overview episode since this expands what was already covered.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MAqvl2TA2s

Check out other Wizard’s Apprentice videos:

Decision Flows:

Lightning Flow Builder: Decision Element! Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 3

Lightning Flow Builder Screen Flows Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 2

 

Wizard’s Apprentice Lightning Experience – Sobject Variables, Collections & Loops Revisted

 

Wizard’s Apprentice: Lightning Flow Builder Overview

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Lightning Flow Builder: Decision Element! Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 3

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Lightning Flow Builder – Decision Element

The Decision Element is one of the most important elements we have in Lightning Flow Builder. It is the only way we can add logic and pathways to our Flow automation.  Unlike Screen elements, Decisions can be used in both Screen and Autolaunched flows.

With Workflow rules, we can add a single set of logic, when the rule should fire its actions. Process Builder expands on this logic. In addition to specifying when actions should be fired, in some circumstances, you can add additional logic. For example, when updating related records as an action, you can specify the criteria the related record must have in order to get updated. Flows allow even more complicated logic. We can add a decision to split the flow of automation.

Unlike Process Builder and Workflow rules we can create many different pathways in our logic. A decision element will always have at least 2 pathways – one based on criteria and a second as the default or “catch all.” You can add additional outcomes to a decision element. You will always have a default outcome. This is the path your flow will take when none of the other outcomes match the criteria being evaluated. In this Lightning Flow example, you’ll see how to use the Decision element, create outcomes, and some use cases.

Decision Element Uses

  1. Split the path of the Flow. This is great for “If a user selects picklist value 1, send them to screen 1. If the user selects picklist value 2, send them to screen 2.” and so forth.
  2. Check Input values. You may be passing values into your resources when the Flow starts. This is very common with Auto-launched flows. Your flow will likely be dependent upon having a value in those resources. I like to have a decision element immediately at the start to ensure that everything I expect to have been passed in has well been passed in. This way if I’m missing something I can error gracefully versus getting a big ugly error message
  3. Check Get Records elements. One of the frustrating things that many Flow users is not checking that Get Records elements found records. It may work 9 out of 10 times. On that 10th time, if your flow assumes you have records and you don’t, you’ll get a nasty error. Using a decision element to check you have found records allows you to have a graceful error or “fault” path.
  4. Ending Flow early. There may be circumstances when you simply want the automation to stop. This could be because of an error (like in use case #3) or because the user doesn’t have the custom permission to let them use the automation. A decision doesn’t have to have a continued path. It can simply stop.

 

Video

This series of Wizard’s Apprentice will focus on a gradual review of the Lightning Flow Builder and Flow concepts to help make you be an automation wizard! Make sure you’ve watched our Lightning Flow Builder Overview episode since this expands what was already covered.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyNjoUTd9XA

 

Check out other Wizard’s Apprentice videos:

Screen Flows:

Lightning Flow Builder Screen Flows Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 2

 

Wizard’s Apprentice Lightning Experience – Sobject Variables, Collections & Loops Revisted

 

Wizard’s Apprentice: Lightning Flow Builder Overview

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 Lightning Flow Builder Screen Flows Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 2
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Lightning Flow Builder Screen Flows Wizard’s Apprentice Episode 2

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Lightning Flow Builder – Screen Flows

Lightning Flow Builder is unique automation tool in Salesforce. You can build Screen Flows, Flows that use the Screen element to display information and accept end-user input into your automation.

This series of Wizard’s Apprentice will focus on a gradual review of the Lightning Flow Builder and Flow concepts to help make you be an automation wizard! Make sure you’ve watched our Lightning Flow Builder Overview episode since this expands what was already covered.

Episode 2 is all about the Flow screen element. It’s how we let our users interact with our flow. It’s unique as it’s the only code-free automation tool with the capability to interact with the automation. Flow Screens gives you a lot of flexibility to control the look and feel of Salesforce.

There are the legacy “classic” screen components like Display Text and Input Text. You can also use Lightning Components in your Flow Screen which opens up Flow to be able to do almost anything. What makes this really special are the “standard” Lightning Components already available in everyone’s Salesforce. Plus, you can get pre-built Flow Screen Lightning Components on the Salesforce AppExchange. You can also develop your own, but that’s a different show. This Lightning Flow example, you’ll learn how to add a Screen Element and the various components available.

How Screen Flows Work

Screen Flows are the most common type of Flow you’ll see used in Trailhead and other walkthroughs, because They are one of the more accessible Flows to start. A Flow Screen at it’s core is very simple. It’s broken into 3 sections, a list of your screen components, your screen preview or “canvas,” and the properties panel. The property panel is the only part of your screen that will change based on what you have selected.

At the start, it shows the Screen Property. What is the Screen Flow’s title? What navigation buttons will be displayed? These are all set with in the Screen Property panel. As you select screen components, the property panel will change to display how to configure that component. It could be something as simple as giving the screen component a name and entering some text to display. It can also be more complicated with multiple options; this often occurs with Lightning Screen Components.

Lightning Flow is a great tool. It is the automation option that bridges the admin between Process Builder and APEX Code. It can do more than Process Builder alone but has limitations that can be address with APEX code. Flow is a tool every admin should be familiar, So let’s start with this Wizard’s Apprentice episode providing an Overview of the Lightning Flow Builder with Screens!. Soon you too will become a Flownatic

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4HHRuKhvRE

 

Check out other Wizard’s Apprentice videos:

Introducing Wizard’s Apprentice

Select Multiple Users for a Chatter Mention in Salesforce Flow

Wizard’s Apprentice Lightning Experience – A First Look

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Wizard’s Apprentice: Lightning Flow Builder Overview

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 Wizard’s Apprentice: Lightning Flow Builder Overview

Lightning Flow Builder replaces the Cloud Designer for Salesforce Flow. While many things have remained the same, the user interface has dramatically changed – for the better!

This series of Wizard’s Apprentice will focus on a gradual review of the Lightning Flow Builder and Flow concepts to help make you be an automation wizard! I’m hoping to have these videos be 10 minutes or less.

We start with episode one which is an overview of the Lightning Flow Builder. Future episodes will review the different Flow Elements, actions, use cases, and tips and tricks of using Flow.

Lightning Flow is one of the declarative automation tools in Salesforce CRM. Flow is unique compared to the other automation tools, Apex and Process Builder. Similarly to Process Builder, Lightning Flow is clicks-based. There’s no code required. Unlike Process Builder, Flow can handle more complicated logic, provide an optional user interface to guide or collect information from a user. Similarly to Apex code, Flow can handle some complicated logic, but unlike APEX code there’s no code involved. Flow also can provide a user interface (Screen) which APEX cannot provide without using Visualforce or Lightning Component. APEX can easily handle thousands and millions of records. Flow has some limitations in data sizes and is ideal for less than 1000 records.

Lightning Flow is a great tool. It is the automation option that bridges the admin between Process Builder and APEX Code. It can do more than Process Builder alone but has limitations that can be address with APEX code. Flow is a tool every admin should be familiar, So let’s start with this Wizard’s Apprentice episode providing an Overview of the Lightning Flow Builder. Soon you too will become a Flownatic

 

 

Check out other Wizard’s Apprentice videos:

Wizard’s Apprentice Lightning Experience – Sobject Variables, Collections & Loops Revisted

Wizard’s Apprentice Lightning Experience – Custom Objects and Lookups

Wizard’s Apprentice Lightning Experience – A First Look

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 Hands-On The New Lightning Flow Builder Spring 19 Pre-release
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Hands-On The New Lightning Flow Builder Spring 19 Pre-release

Hands-On The New Lightning Flow Builder Spring 19 Pre-release

I’m so excited! Spring ’19 is out in pre-release!

For those of you lucky enough to have previously signed up for a pre-release org, you now have access to Salesforce Spring ’19. If you don’t have a pre-release, as of this posting, you’re out of luck. Sorry. Sign up for a Spring ’19 prerelease isn’t available yet.

One of the reasons I’m excited is because Spring ’19 is supposed to hold the all-new Lightning Flow Builder! Goodby Cloud Designer! Hello Flow Builder!

I’ve been waiting for the new builder before I continue the Wizard Apprentice series on Flow. Now, it is here and I’m going to give you a sneak peek.

Something I want to emphasize is this is Pre-Release. This means that features can be added, removed, or changed between now and when the release finally makes it to our production orgs. Some things that aren’t in the builder now, maybe there come release. The builder may change how things are done. Or, heavens forbid, the Lightning Flow Builder won’t be part of the final Spring ’19 release.

Okay, enough of the preamble! Check out the video. In addition to doing a hands-on first-time look of Lightning Flow Builder, I do a side-by-side comparison of the Cloud Flow Designer using a similar structured Flow.

First Time Hands-On Look at Lightning Flow Builder & Cloud Designer Comparison

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZKyFjlypjI&feature=youtu.be

Click if embedded video does not play

First Hands-On look at Salesforce Lightning Flow Builder

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I run this site, the podcast, and my training videos for the community. I do incur some costs. I greatly appreciate if you can help me out by checking out my affiliates and – if you shop amazon – start your search on my site.

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Update Only User Selected Records From a Multi-Select List in Flow

Wizard Apprentice – Update Only User Selected Records From a Multi-Select List in Flow

One of the big frustrations people have with Flow is having users select records is a royal pain. There’s no “Lookup” field for a flow screen and searching for records can be messy and inconsistent. Unless you’re prepared to create a custom Lightning Component to embed into a Flow Screen, you’re almost out of luck.

There’s is a way if you’re able to provide a way to limit the possible records.

In this video, I show how you can provide a multi-select field displaying multiple records and then update only the records the user selects. It involves a few tricks and it works best when the potential list of records is small. In my example, the Flow is designed to list records related to a single account.

Pieces of the Flow

Here’s are the elements in the Flow:

  • Screen – With a multi-select for users to select records
  • Fast Lookup – To lookup the records the user might select
  • Loop – To loop through the sObject Collection from the Fast Lookup
  • Decision Element – Determine if the individual record being looped was selected
  • Screens – 1 to show a record not selected, 1 to ask for the user to input the value to update the selected record
  • Assignment – To assign the user input to the sObject Variable
  • Assignment – To add to a new sObject Collection for updating records
  • Fast Update – Update all the in the update sObject Collection

Behind the Scenes

  • Dynamic Choice – Contains list of records for users to choose from. These are the choices of the multi-select field on the first screen
  • variable: recordId – input variable to grab the ID of the record when used in a Flow Action
  • variable: vrAccountID – variable for the Account ID, default value is recordId
  • sObject Collection Variable: vrSoColAssets – Assets in the Fast Lookup. The records should mirror the records in the dynamic choice
  • Sobject Variable: vrSoAsset – A single asset record for the loop.
  • sObject Collection Variable: vrSoColUpdate – a collection variable to hold vrSoAssets that are going to be updated
  • Multi-Select Checkboxes Field: Select_Assets – this is the field on the first screen that uses the dynamic choice
  • variable: vrSelectedAssetsIDs – Text Variable which the value is Select_Assets
  • Outcome: Selected – This is from the decision element. To determine if a specific record was elected we check to see if vrSelectedAssetIDs contains vrSoAsset.id

 

Wizard Apprentice Flow Tutorial

How would you use this Flow trick? Do you know of a better way of accomplishing this without writing code? Let me know!

Want to see more videos on Flow? Let me know in the comments what you want to see!

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I run this site, the podcast, and my training videos for the community. I do incur some costs. I greatly appreciate if you can help me out by checking out my affiliates and – if you shop amazon – start your search on my site.

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