Listen to this article
Roy Fielding who invented REST in 2000 defined it as a design pattern for Application Program Interface – APIs.
REST is basically known as a Representational State Transfer, it creates a data object when requested by the clients and sends the object values to the users. For data objects, you have a new object upon request and REST is used, It is an architectural style used by many web development companies in the USA to provide web services and application development. As well as, REST is used to make an approach for communications purposes.
Next is the REST API integration (which works as a SaaS) that sends data from your app, then is collected by Salesforce. An example of integration using REST API is a RESTful web application that exposes information and its resources. This way a client can act on the obtained resources, such as to create a new user or to edit a post.
Uses of REST API
A company having several products and deals in the sales and marketing area has a Salesforce API. As the Salesforce has a large reach, a REST API integration testing with Salesforce gives more benefits. Because of the benefits of REST API in Salesforce, the most tuned sales approach is listing your products or apps on the Salesforce ecosystem.
If a company is strong and big in size, it automatically turns towards Salesforce to get better results in sales and marketing. The excellent Salesforce developers’ community has a pre-written and well-identified solution to any obstacle.
How to build a basic salesforce REST API integration?
A Salesforce REST API works to find data from the Salesforce upon the data sent from your application or product. Though there are no costs for these integrations, one thing which we must understand is that REST integration on Salesforce is accessible to the Salesforce users on their enterprise plans.
Salesforce integration has three major steps involved in it:
- Authorization
- User side data push
- User side data retrieval
With this much knowledge in our hands, let us start to learn Salesforce REST API Integration in the easiest possible manner.
Create a developer account
Developers’ accounts are very useful because with the accounts you can get your hands-on with the interface. For Salesforce organizations, adding and deleting users is also easy.
Live Product Demo by our Experts
Once your Salesforce developer account is set, click on the SETUP icon (which is on the top-right corner navigation menu) to set a connected app.
Enter the text “App Manager” in the search or Quick Find box. Now, select App Manager.
Click on the new connected App
Enter the basic information as follows, fill the form, and remember the filled information throughout the integration using REST API.
- Connect App Name – YourAppName.
- API Name – this name automatically becomes ‘YourAppName’.
- Contact Email – enter your working and authentic email address.
Enable OAuth settings for API
- Check Enable OAuth Settings.
- Form your own Callback URL, example: https://www.yourappname.com/api/callback.
Now, the Salesforce will post the above-mentioned URL whenever the user authorizes your app to access its data. This is how an access token and a request token are generated and used.
Follow these steps in the OAuth Scopes
- Select Access to start managing your data via REST API integration.
- Click Add.
If your app is set, then you will get a Consumer Key. Also, for your app, you will get a Consumer Secret. Now, your user is directed to the authorization endpoint of Saleforce.com. At that endpoint, they first log in then give the approval to access their data for your app.
The Access token now is passed in all API requests for accessing data. In other words, the applications make API requests on behalf of the users by using an access token. The Refresh token retrieves a valid access token. Finally, the request token verifies the request which has been made. Once, the request is verified, data is retrieved.
Retrieving data from Salesforce to App
The Salesforce objects refer to those database tables, which have stored the organization’s data. This data includes accounts, contacts, product information, leads, schedules, and tasks. With this amount of data, a custom object is created which is then described by the Salesforce record upon a certain occurrence. A data retrieval is now done when a request to the contact endpoint is successfully made. Upon a request, you get return information related to the object.
Furthermore, using objects combination describes the endpoint that gives access to all the fields from the users. Thus, access to all these fields is used to build a custom query which in return provides all the associated properties about that object.
Conclusion
Salesforce REST API integration is simple, easy to work, and uses HTTP requests. This integrated API has shown good enterprise success, both at the customer level and the organization’s level. This piece of technology developed in 2000 is used with various mobile applications by many mobile app development services providers in the USA.
Making RESTful API applications is a path-breaking tech-stack for data accessing, retrieving, and processing. The REST API integration with Salesforce is a successful hit.
