Top 6 Things from TrailblazerDX

TrailblazerDX 2022

Demand Chain’s team of experts were out at TrailblazerDX (TDX22)—Salesforce’s premier annual developer event in San Francisco last week. It was great to be back experiencing the Ohana live and in-person again! Here are some of the top findings our team shared back with us:

1. Mulesoft Mountain

Mulesoft Anypoint Solution: “I knew Mulesoft was a robust solution but did not realize Mulesoft has advanced and built out some great functionality to enhance integration capabilities.” Mulesoft is a unified, single solution for iPaaS (Integration Platform as a Service) and a full life-cycle API management tool. It has over 300 available connectors and is growing rapidly with built-in security and analytics features. Users now have the ability to connect to old mainframe (blue/green screen) technology. Do you want to integrate with GraphQL? Mulesoft can do that too! It is a great tool for integrations with multiple touchpoints. More info: https://www.mulesoft.com/

2. OmniStudio Data Tools

OmniStudio session attendees learned about the potential power and ease that comes with using OmniStudio’s digital engagement suite of products. Even for a dev-layperson like me, using a guided experience to connect data with Integration Procedures and DataRaptors made sense! What specifically caught my attention was OmniStudio’s FlexCards and OmniScripts. FlexCards display contextual information in an at-a-glance format and provide access to relevant tasks for the displayed data. Imagine being able to leverage external APIs so that you can work with both SFDC data and data from external sources, deploy toast callouts, and contextual info and actions, and easily display AND collect data. Did I mention FlexCards are leverageable via LWCs? Did I also mention both FlexCards and OmniScripts can be leveraged via all OmniChannel channels? This is a set of tools I’m looking forward to working with in the future! More info: https://www.salesforce.com/products/omnistudio/overview.

3. DocuSign

While at TDX22, I attended a great presentation given by DocuSign’s Greg Hardigan covering DocuSign’s Contract Lifecycle Management (CLM) for Salesforce. This solution is powerful, flexible, and easier than ever to use. In less than 30 minutes, Greg showed us how DocuSign CLM for Salesforce can manage approvals and negotiations, leverage Flow and Apex to dictate document workflows, approve documents via SMS, and even notarize documents in real-time while sitting in a Zoom meeting. (Yes. Electronic notaries are now accepted in most jurisdictions.) Going in, I thought of DocuSign as another e-signature solution that plugs into Salesforce. Coming out, this is something I want to kick the tires on and work with! More info: https://www.docusign.com/solutions/salesforce

4. Hyperforce

I had not heard of Hyperforce prior to TDX22 but discovered it’s been around for over a year. The aim of Hyperforce is to unify the foundations of the various Salesforce clouds and allow Salesforce to scale using public cloud partners. Salesforce is now utilizing other public cloud partners like Amazon AWS, Google’s Cloud Platform, and Microsoft Azure. Salesforce is utilizing the economies of scale of everyone using AWS, GCP or Azure and its benefits. Existing and potential Salesforce customers now have the flexibility to choose where their Salesforce instance is located, which solves issues related to scalability and geographic location. Plus, it could change the cloud software industry with its embedded regulatory checks. More info: https://www.salesforce.com/products/platform/hyperforce/.

5. SharinPix

There are some AppExchange partners that “upped their game” during the pandemic! Example – SharinPix. Do you need to work with PDFs? SharinPix allows you to take a snapshot of any document, auto-magically detect its edges, place Salesforce fields on it, make annotations, and even collect signatures. Do you need to prove your employees’ photos are actually taken in the geographic location they are in? SharinPix leverages all the metadata that comes with every picture taken on today’s smart devices – including GPS coordinates. Are you concerned about the amount of storage all these photos will use? According to SharinPix’s AppExchange listing, unlimited storage is now built into their licenses. Do you have areas of your business that are not (yet) using Salesforce? Your divisions, customers, and partners can now upload images to Salesforce and view and annotate images without Salesforce access. A simple SharinPix integration with your website, community, your own mobile app, or even via a shared link gives people all the access they do (or don’t) need. More info: https://www.sharinpix.com/

6. Slack

Slack Summit: It was great to hear and see all the excitement around Slack, and how it’s becoming the springboard for future Salesforce functionality. There are still quite a few “unknowns” around Slack, but it is encouraging to see the progress and access to frameworks (SDK’s and Bolt.js) that give developers the ability to create a customized Slack experience. More info: https://www.salesforce.com/products/slack/overview/

This list of six things just scratches the surface—what a great event!