1) We have implemented Person Accounts.

2) We have a custom object that has a Master Detail Relationship with the Account object.

3) We are attempting to implement Act-On utilizing information from the custom object.  However, Act-On requires the use of Contact Id.  Today, I have added a Contact Lookup field to the custom object with intention to use it in a custom report type.

4) I am trying to figure out a way, without APEX if possible, to populate the Contact ID in the custom object with the corresponding Contact that is associated the Account (Person Account).   I tried a Workflow Field Update, but it appears it is not possible to update a Lookup field using this method.

5) Is there a way to update the Contact with the Contact ID of the Master Object Person Account on the custom object when a new record is created?  Or do I have to find a APEX programmer?

I have a Master Detail relationship between Opportunities and a custom object.  The Opportunity record has a Summary Formula that uses the custom object.  We also have a Validation Rule on the Opportunity object.  Is there a way to construct the Validation Rule to skip if a custom object record is updated.  According the documentation, the Validation Rule fires when the Summary Formula is recalculated, is there way to skip this?

We have Single Sign Implemented here and it is going well except when new Chatter Users are invited by another User to join Chatter.  I am doing some preliminary research to determine if we can overwrite the standard Chatter 'Invite Co-Worker's Functionality.  Some high level requirements:

1) Replace current 'Invite Co-Workers' button with a custom button.

2) Current User clicks on new 'Invite Co-Worker' button and fills out the 'Invite People to Chatter' form.

3) The invited user should receive a modified email template that includes our custom domain (not login.salesforce.com).

4) When the User clicks on the URL in the email template, they should be directred to a custom landing page that requires them to enter First Name, Last Name, Title, at least 1 Phone Number, and select the correct timezone.  (Many Users don't bother verifying the correct time zone, so we would rather have no default time zone and make it a required field.)

5) Somehow, behind the scenes the invited User's user record's Federation ID is updated with the correct ID (it may not be the email address original entered by the user sending the invite.

Has anyone done anything like this before?  Any suggestions?

We are in the process of migrating our all Chatter from a Trial org to our Production org. A Salesforce employee sent me a copy of "Chatter Data Import and Export" published December 2011.

I am trying to find a more up to date document as with each release the Chatter API is updated. I am using the Data Loader to guess which objects contain which Chatter records. I am hoping to find a definitive up to date guide.

Thanks

Mark Bruso

We are having a difficult issue with Chatter.  Situation:
- IE8 via Virtual Desktop Integration
- Every user receiving the interment error message when clickin on various links on Chatter page.  In my case, I can reproduce the error if I click on a File then attempt to 'Share with People'.  The error message reads "The action performed was invalid for your session."
- This error happens all the time and is hurting our Chatter adoption.
- We confirmed ChromeFrame was running in IE.  We tried removing CF, and the error persists.
- We confirmed Java Script is running.
- The problem does not occur when running IE8 on a local machine.
- We compared all the IE settings between the local machine and on the VDI, but all settings were the same.
- I reviewed the IE browser settings in the Help system and they match.
- So far this problem only is seen in Chatter.

Has anyone else seen this problem?  Can anyone help?  Salesforce support has not been helpful so far.

Thanks

Mark

Space Coast CRM is a Salesforce.com Silver Cloud Alliance Partner based on Florida's central east coast.  Our pipeline is starting to filll up and we are looking to network with other Certified Consultants to help out with future projects.

Must Haves

• A local consultant with customer facing skills.   You should be located within a 1 hour drive of Brevard County, Florida (Area Code:321; Zip Code: 329xx).  THIS IS NOT A REMOTE POSITION.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Ability to meet with potential new clients in person, gather requirements, and promote Space Coast CRM in the best possible light.
• Ideally somone who is 201 and Sales Cloud certified.  You should have functional implementation skills.  We are NOT seeking developers.
• Looking for part-time 1099 project work.

Primary Responsibilties

• Assist in pre-sales activities such as work estimation and proposal creation
• Develop project scope, gather new business requirements, develop design documents, and customize application.
• Provide post-implementation support as needed
• Training customers in a group or one-to-one setting

Please understand we don't have any immediate projects, however, we are optimistic that we will need to add resources within the next 1-2 months.

Please send your contact information to http://www.linkedin.com/in/markbruso

From what I have read it appears it is possible to create an Email Alert that includes the Record Owner Manager.  But I can't find that choice in the Email Alert setup page.  Is this possible?

I have a client who is having a non native/composite application developed by another 3rd party firm.  I am trying to find some information on if and how a non native application can work through the Partner Portal.

We have heard that the Partner Portal license does not include the ability to access a non native/composite application.  Is this true?

If this is true, then how can an external user such as a dealer use the application?  Would we have to use a Force.com license instead?  This is problematic, because the external users will need access to the Opportunity object which is not available to via the Force.com license.

We have also heard that we might need to purchase both Partner Portal and Force.com licenses for these 2000 external Users.  How can this be the case?  It was my understanding that a User can only be assigned a single User License Type.

Has anyone else run into this scenario before?

Thanks!

Mark Bruso

I am assisting one of my clients implement Salesforce for Outlook and I am looking for best practices with regards to sync'ing contacts.

One common challenge I see at multiple SFDC customers are that many Users will have a different set of Contacts in the Outlook.  Many Outlook Users will share some of the same Contacts.  In addition, it's typical to see Contact records will be inconsistently populated by users.

After sync'ing with Salesforce we see duplicate Contacts and Contacts with no Account names.

Does anyone have any good best practices and experience on how best to address these issues?

Thanks

Mark Bruso

1) The 'About Action Plans' tab says that Cases are supported.  However, there does not appear to be any hooks to the Cases object.    Does this require customization (APEX)?

2)  We have EE.  Should we install the Managed or Unmanaged app?

I am working at a very large client and we are currently required to create a new sandbox each time we are ready for our next release to be tested.  For example we have DEVR1 that needs to be recreated into another sandbox named DEVRTEST1.  We have a developer who is using ANT to push the meta data from one org to another, but numerous elements are being missed such as:

Users

Roles

Some aspects of Profiles

Queues

Groups

Field History Tracking

Lead Field Mapping

Approval Processes

etc.

Needless to say it takes considerable time manually recreate the above items in each new sandbox.  Is there anyway to clone a SBX into a new Sandbox?

We are having a difficult issue with Chatter.  Situation:
- IE8 via Virtual Desktop Integration
- Every user receiving the interment error message when clickin on various links on Chatter page.  In my case, I can reproduce the error if I click on a File then attempt to 'Share with People'.  The error message reads "The action performed was invalid for your session."
- This error happens all the time and is hurting our Chatter adoption.
- We confirmed ChromeFrame was running in IE.  We tried removing CF, and the error persists.
- We confirmed Java Script is running.
- The problem does not occur when running IE8 on a local machine.
- We compared all the IE settings between the local machine and on the VDI, but all settings were the same.
- I reviewed the IE browser settings in the Help system and they match.
- So far this problem only is seen in Chatter.

Has anyone else seen this problem?  Can anyone help?  Salesforce support has not been helpful so far.

Thanks

Mark

I am trying to import Attachments exported from another Org into this Org. Shortly after attempting to 'Finish' the import using the DataLoader (v17), I am getting a Java Heap Space error. I have tried rebooting the PC. None of the files are larger than 5MB.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.