Spring is right around the corner, and we are already diving into the Salesforce Spring ’16 release. Winter ’16 brought us the Lightning Experience, and Spring ’16 takes Lightning to the next level with several huge improvements. Other improvements are coming as well, including more sandboxes and security check-ups. With so many new features in store with this release, we have picked some of our favorites so far.
1. Inline Editing in Lightning
This is a big one. The calls for inline editing in Lightning came almost as soon as the Lightning Interface debuted. This commonly used feature from the classic version of Salesforce that allows users to edit records quickly and efficiently will now be available in the Lightning Experience.
This feature is a must-have for time-crunched users, and we are absolutely thrilled to see that it will now be available for Lightning Experience. The Spring ’16 release will allow inline editing for all record details. Inline editing for highlights and list views will be coming in a future release.
2. More Sandboxes
As part of its efforts to make the process of building applications on App Cloud easy and fluid, Salesforce is drastically increasing the number of developer sandboxes available to help. Additional sandboxes will give developers more capacity to develop and test new custom applications.
Enterprise users’ sandbox limits will climb from 1 to 25, the limit for Unlimited users will increase from 15 to 50, and Performance users will see limits increase from 30 to an incredible 100 sandboxes!
3. View Security Risks with Health Check
Ever wonder if your security settings are really good enough? Health Check will allow you to compare your session settings, password policies and network access settings against Salesforce benchmarks. You will receive a security “score” based on how your settings stack up against what Salesforce recommends. For example, if you relax password complexity requirements, you will see your security score decrease.
With the number of cybersecurity threats increasing at a seemingly exponential rate, this will be a great tool to help you visualize where you really stand with your organization’s security.
4. A New “Composer” Window for Global Actions
Another time-saving feature, the new composer window allows users to create a task, event or note or log a call without having to navigate back to that record.
For example, if you just received a message from a prospect and need to set a task to follow up, you can create that task without having to spend time going all the way back to the prospect’s record in Salesforce. In addition to saving users a significant amount of time, this should remove some of the administrative burden that comes with activity tracking.
5. Resizable Columns for List Views in Lightning
We love our list views, and we love that we will now be able to resize our list view columns in Lightning. If you have long naming conventions, or if you try to squeeze as much data into a list view as possible, this small feature should remove a lot of future frustration.
6. Create Records Directly from Outlook
Outlook users already know what a huge value the Salesforce for Outlook Connector is. (If you’re not familiar with it, you can read about it here.) A new feature with the Spring ’16 release will enable even greater workflow efficiency by providing users with the ability to create new records from directly within Outlook or Office 365.
This will function much like the new composer window, allowing a user to make a global action without ever having to navigate to the record.
With so many improvements to Lightning Experience coming with the Spring ’16 release, now’s a good time to consider whether your organization is ready to make the jump from classic to Lightning.
Spring is right around the corner, and we are already diving into the Salesforce Spring ’16 release. Winter ’16 brought us the Lightning Experience, and Spring ’16 takes Lightning to the next level with several huge improvements. Other improvements are coming as well, including more sandboxes and security check-ups. With so many new features in store with this release, we have picked some of our favorites so far.
1. Inline Editing in Lightning
This is a big one. The calls for inline editing in Lightning came almost as soon as the Lightning Interface debuted. This commonly used feature from the classic version of Salesforce that allows users to edit records quickly and efficiently will now be available in the Lightning Experience.
This feature is a must-have for time-crunched users, and we are absolutely thrilled to see that it will now be available for Lightning Experience. The Spring ’16 release will allow inline editing for all record details. Inline editing for highlights and list views will be coming in a future release.
2. More Sandboxes
As part of its efforts to make the process of building applications on App Cloud easy and fluid, Salesforce is drastically increasing the number of developer sandboxes available to help. Additional sandboxes will give developers more capacity to develop and test new custom applications.
Enterprise users’ sandbox limits will climb from 1 to 25, the limit for Unlimited users will increase from 15 to 50, and Performance users will see limits increase from 30 to an incredible 100 sandboxes!
3. View Security Risks with Health Check
Ever wonder if your security settings are really good enough? Health Check will allow you to compare your session settings, password policies and network access settings against Salesforce benchmarks. You will receive a security “score” based on how your settings stack up against what Salesforce recommends. For example, if you relax password complexity requirements, you will see your security score decrease.
With the number of cybersecurity threats increasing at a seemingly exponential rate, this will be a great tool to help you visualize where you really stand with your organization’s security.
4. A New “Composer” Window for Global Actions
Another time-saving feature, the new composer window allows users to create a task, event or note or log a call without having to navigate back to that record.
For example, if you just received a message from a prospect and need to set a task to follow up, you can create that task without having to spend time going all the way back to the prospect’s record in Salesforce. In addition to saving users a significant amount of time, this should remove some of the administrative burden that comes with activity tracking.
5. Resizable Columns for List Views in Lightning
We love our list views, and we love that we will now be able to resize our list view columns in Lightning. If you have long naming conventions, or if you try to squeeze as much data into a list view as possible, this small feature should remove a lot of future frustration.
6. Create Records Directly from Outlook
Outlook users already know what a huge value the Salesforce for Outlook Connector is. (If you’re not familiar with it, you can read about it here.) A new feature with the Spring ’16 release will enable even greater workflow efficiency by providing users with the ability to create new records from directly within Outlook or Office 365.
This will function much like the new composer window, allowing a user to make a global action without ever having to navigate to the record.
With so many improvements to Lightning Experience coming with the Spring ’16 release, now’s a good time to consider whether your organization is ready to make the jump from classic to Lightning.
