Proof that salesforce.com listens – and comprehends

September 29, 2009 · Filed Under salesforce.com · 4 Comments 

About two weeks ago, I posted a list of the many setup steps I took to make my Winter ’10 prerelease org useable. Those are the same steps I have to take whenever setting up any Developer Edition org for the first time as well.
An insider at salesforce.com forwarded me this email that a senior person sent to quite a few also-senior people on various product teams:



Subject:


 Preparing a New Org. Each Pre-Release. In 27 steps.


Body:


Yikes.
http://www.x2od.com/2009/09/16/preparing-a-new-org.html

This is not the most widely-read blog about Salesforce, but it feels good to know that salesforce.com does have its ear to the ground and is taking seriously even the indirect feedback that we bloggers provide.

Kudos, salesforce.com.

PS. While I’m at it, I may as well also mention that too many fields are invisible to every profile. Example on Account: Site, Ownership, SIC Code, and more. And Annual Revenue is invisible to Customer Portal users. It would be great to have a guide or documentation.
PPS. Turns out that there’s no rhyme nor reason why some orgs have various fields invisible. Between demo, developer, trial, prerelease, and more, some fields are available and some are not. It is a huge waste of time to find all the fields and enable them.

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Preparing a New Org

September 16, 2009 · Filed Under Configuration, Native Application, Tips and Tricks, salesforce.com · 7 Comments 

With the impending arrival of the Winter 2010 (aka 162 or Winter'10) edition of Salesforce CRM, as with every other release, comes a prerelease org. (You can get one at https://www.salesforce.com/form/trial/prerelease_winter10.jsp.)

Every time one encounters a fresh org, there are maintenance tasks to perform. I usually go through an org (whether a Developer Edition org or a Prerelease version) and do the same tasks, generally in no particular order. This time, however, I wrote down what I did as I did it. Looking at the list, it's hardly in any "best practices" order at all - it's just how I did it.

There's no need to follow every step, and it is not a complete list of all possibilities, but this should give you some idea of the possibilities and available tweaks: (*** indicates some of the new features in WInter '10)

  1. Save login with 1Password/Roboform
  2. Reset (Set) Security Token
  3. Administration Setup | Security Controls
    • Session time 8 hrs
    • Passwords never expire
  4. Create Record Types (and Business Processes) for Lead, Opportunity, Case
  5. (Campaigns were not enabled in this prerelease org) - would have configured them here, similarly
  6. Activities section: Calendar link on sidebar
  7. Download latest versions of Connect for Outlook, Office Edition
  8. Opportunities:
    • Enable Similar Opportunities
    • Enable Opportunity Teams
  9. Create Account Master Record Type
  10. Enable Account Teams
  11. Create Contact Master Record Type
    • Note: Asked to add to page layout. Not asked for Opportunities.
  12. Enable Case Teams
  13. Enable Public Solutions
  14. Solutions:
    • Enable Solution Browsing
    • Enable Solution HTML
    • Could have created a Solution Process & Record Type
    • Did not enable multilingual solutions
  15. Enable Self-Service
  16. Enable Web-to-Case
  17. Create default Owner, etc (auto prompted)
  18. Enable PRM and Partner Portal (though have no licenses)
  19. Salesforce to Salesforce
    • Enabled S2S
    • Set up S2S Connection Finder ***
    • Added fields to page layout - Kept read-only for all profiles except System Administrator
    • Enable Public & Private Tags
  20. Enable Console for all Profiles
  21. Search Settings - Enable Enhanced Lookup & Auto-Complete
  22. User Interface
    • Separate loading of related lists
    • Spell Checker on Tasks & Events
    • Collapsible Sidebar
    • Custom Sidebar on all Pages
    • Enhanced Profile Management ***
  23. Set myself as default Workflow User
  24. Looked at Develop | Custom Settings ***
  25. Created a Default Queue and added myself
  26. Set all Sharing Rules to Private
  27. Update Home Page to the way I like it
    • Order of wide section (top down): Calendar, Tasks, Items to Approve, Dashboard
    • No changes to narrow section

Other things that may be possible in other orgs:

  • Enable Customer Portal
  • Customize Campaigns
  • Set up Sites

Again, this is not meant to be a complete list. Also, it is not intended to be a how-to; for more information you may search the Help link at the top of every org page, check Salesforce Community, or Developer Force.

Happy configuring!

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