Visualforce page render as pdf example

We can render any page as pdf  by adding renderAs attribute to <apex:page> and specifying “pdf” as value. renderAs value is name of any supported content converter. Currently PDF is the only supported content converter. Setting renderAs attribute to “pdf” renders the page as a PDF.

Rendering a Visualforce page as a PDF is intended for pages that are designed and optimized for print. Standard components that are not  easily formatted for print or contain form elements like inputs, buttons, any component that requires Javascript to be formatted, should not be used.  We should always verify the format of your rendered page before deploying it.

Sometimes PDF fails to display all the characters properly. In that case we should adjust the fonts in our CSS to use a font that supports our needs. We can use style element for displaying content properly in PDF.

In the example below, we are showing 10 account in table in visualforce page which is renderAs “pdf”. We are just adding renderAs attribute in apex:page and giving “pdf” as its value.

Click for Demo

Visualforce Page

<apex:page controller="PdfExampleController" renderAs="pdf">
  <apex:form >
    <apex:pageBlock >
        <apex:pageBlockTable value="{!accList}" var="acc" border="2">
           <apex:column value="{!acc.name}"/>
           <apex:column value="{!acc.annualrevenue}"/>
           <apex:column value="{!acc.type}"/>
           <apex:column value="{!acc.accountnumber}"/>
           <apex:column value="{!acc.rating}"/>
        </apex:pageBlockTable>
    </apex:pageBlock>
  </apex:form>
</apex:page>

Apex Code:

public with sharing class PdfExampleController {
    public List accList{get;set;}
    public PdfExampleController (){
        accList = [select id,name,type,accountnumber,annualrevenue,Rating from account limit 10];
    }
}

Please note that this page is not optimized to be renderAs pdf. Salesforce has provided Best Practices for Rendering PDFs.

Salesforce record id hack first 3 digit

This post is going to be interesting. As we all know that each record in salesforce is identified by record id which is unique for every organisation. Salesforce record id can be 15 digit case sensitive or 18 digit case insensitive. Last three digits of 18 digit record id provide checksum of first 15 digits.

Now interesting and important point is that first 3 digits of record id determines SObject type of record. For every salesforce object first 3 digit of record id is unique. And for all standard salesforce objects, first 3 digits of record id is constant. For example, for standard Account object first 3 digit of record id is 001. Similarly for Contact object first 3 digit is 003. These first three digit of record id is known as ‘Record id prefix’.

For each custom object also, first 3 digit of record id is unique.

Trick 1:
Remembering these 3 digits of object’s record id is very useful. When we will enter first 3 digits of record id after instance URL we will be on List view page for that particular object.

Trick 2:

We can also directly go to any object tab if we remember first 3 digit of object’s record id. For example, as we know first 3 digits of Account object’s record id is 001. So if we will enter ‘001/o ‘ after instance URL, we will land to Account tab. In similar way we can go to any tab if we know or remember first 3 digits of record id.

actionRegion visualforce salesforce

actionRegion provides an area of a Visualforce page that decides and separates which components should be processed by the force.com server when an AJAX request is generated. Only the components which are inside actionregion component are processed by server, so it increases visualforce page performance. Here components means, all visualforce tags like inputField, outputField, outputPanels etc.

actionregion is one of the most important tag which helps in increasing page performance. So we should try to make maximum use of actionregion in visualforce page. actionRegion component only defines which components the server processes during a request, it does not define which of the page are re-rendered when the request completes. We will still use reRender attribute on action component to decide area which should be rerendered AJAX request completes.

One more important point to note is that even when we use <apex:actionRegion> component, whole form is still submitted but only area which is inside actionRegion is processed by server.

I will explain importance of actionRegion with help of two examples. First example will not use actionRegion and second example will use actionRegion. Here in both example we are trying to show phone textbox, when we are selecting customer priority as high.

Example 1 Without <apex:actionRegion>

Click for demo without actionRegion

In this example, we are trying to show phone textbox when we are selecting high customer priority, then we are getting error as SLA and Account name is required. So validation fails.

Visualforce Page:

<apex:page controller="withoutActionregionController" tabStyle="Account">
    <apex:form id="myform">
        <apex:pageBlock id="pageId">
            <apex:pageBlockSection title="If you will select High Customer Priority then phone textbox will be shown" columns="1" id="out" collapsible="false">
                
                <apex:pageBlockSectionItem >
                    <apex:outputLabel value="{!$ObjectType.Account.fields.CustomerPriority__c.label}" for="priority"/>
                    
                    <apex:inputField value="{!acc.CustomerPriority__c}" id="priority" >
                        <apex:actionSupport action="{!priorityChanged}" reRender="pageId" event="onchange"/>
                    </apex:inputField>
                </apex:pageBlockSectionItem>
                
                <apex:inputField value="{!acc.Phone}" rendered="{!showPhone}"/>
            </apex:pageBlockSection>  
            
            <apex:pageBlockSection title="Other Account Details" columns="2" collapsible="false">
                <apex:inputField value="{!acc.SLA__c}" required="true"/>
                <apex:inputField value="{!acc.Rating}"/>
                <apex:inputField value="{!acc.name}"/>
            </apex:pageBlockSection>  
        </apex:pageBlock>
    </apex:form>
</apex:page>

Apex Code:

public class withoutActionregionController {
    public Account acc{get;set;}
    public Boolean showPhone{get;set;}
    
    public withoutActionregionController(){
        acc = new Account();
        showPhone = false;
    }
    
    public PageReference priorityChanged(){
        if(acc.CustomerPriority__c == 'High'){
            showPhone = true;
        }
        else{
            showPhone = false;
        }
        return null;
    }
}

Now in second example we will use same code but with actionRegion tag. So in second example no validation error will be returned as only code inside actionregion component is processed by server.

Example 2 with <apex:actionRegion>

Click for demo with ActionRegion

Visualforce Page:

<apex:page controller="withActionregionController" tabStyle="Account">
    <apex:form id="myform">
        <apex:pageBlock id="pageId">
            <apex:pageBlockSection title="If you will select High Customer Priority then phone textbox will be shown" columns="1" id="out" collapsible="false">
                
                <apex:pageBlockSectionItem >
                    <apex:outputLabel value="{!$ObjectType.Account.fields.CustomerPriority__c.label}" for="priority"/>
                    
                    <apex:actionRegion >
                    <apex:inputField value="{!acc.CustomerPriority__c}" id="priority" >
                        <apex:actionSupport action="{!priorityChanged}" reRender="pageId" event="onchange"/>
                    </apex:inputField>
                    </apex:actionRegion>
                </apex:pageBlockSectionItem>
                
                <apex:inputField value="{!acc.Phone}" rendered="{!showPhone}"/>
            </apex:pageBlockSection>  
            
            <apex:pageBlockSection title="Other Account Details" columns="2" collapsible="false">
                <apex:inputField value="{!acc.SLA__c}" required="true"/>
                <apex:inputField value="{!acc.Rating}"/>
                <apex:inputField value="{!acc.name}"/>
            </apex:pageBlockSection>  
        </apex:pageBlock>
    </apex:form>
</apex:page>

Apex Code:

public class withActionregionController {
    public Account acc{get;set;}
    public Boolean showPhone{get;set;}
    
    public withActionregionController(){
        acc = new Account();
        showPhone = false;
    }
    
    public PageReference priorityChanged(){
        if(acc.CustomerPriority__c == 'High'){
            showPhone = true;
        }
        else{
            showPhone = false;
        }
        return null;
    }
}

Difference between Export & Export All in data loader is really interesting.

I was asked this question in one of my job interview.

Export and Export All

There are two buttons available in dataloader ‘Export’ & ‘Export All’. Difference in both button functionality is very small. When we use ‘Export’ button for any object in salesforce, all records( excluding records present in Recycle Bin) present in the system for that particular object are exported to a .csv file. But when we use Export All, all records (including records present in Recycle Bin) for that particular object are exported to a .csv file. Deleted records present in recycle bin are also called ‘soft Deleted’ records.

When you choose fields to be extracted using data loader, you can select IsDeleted field as well because it tells which record is soft deleted and which is not.

IsDeleted

(IsDeleted = true) –> record has been soft deleted.

(IsDeleted = false) –> record has not been deleted.

I clicked on Export All and in the screenshot below, you can see there are some records for which IsDeleted is true. These are some records that were present in recycle bin(soft deleted).

For more reference on data loader, Go to Data Loader Reference