问题
I need to add columns to a salesforce report dynamically(based on particular conditions). I'm planning to do this with a trigger that is looking for my conditions. My two questions,
- Is it possible to adding columns dynamically for a Report?
- Can we schedule triggers based on time intervals instead of database updates?
Thanks, BR Madura
回答1:
I'm not aware of any possibility to manipulate Reports from Apex. Report definitions can be retrieved and modified with Metadata API (the one used in Eclipse IDE for example) but that means you'd have to use hacks since Metadata API is not easily available in Apex.
It's a kind of "known problem" and many people have already researched it:
- http://boards.developerforce.com/t5/Apex-Code-Development/Is-it-possible-to-call-Metadata-API-from-Apex-code-Getting-Error/td-p/119412
- https://github.com/financialforcedev/apex-mdapi - looks really interesting I'd say
- https://salesforce.stackexchange.com/questions/1082/has-anyone-ever-successfully-invoked-the-metadata-api-from-within-apex
Do you really think that some kind of "dynamic report" is a valid solution for business need though? I mean - users would be confused if they added some columns to the report and next day the report definition will change wiping out their work...
As for the other question - you probably shouldn't use the word "trigger" ;) If you want some Apex to run in time intervals you should have a lookt at job scheduling (write a class that implements Schedulable) and then you can schedule it to run at specific times. Without special tweaking the job can fire even every hour.
Of course there's also option of time-based workflows that would perform a field update and cause some real trigger to fire but that's very data-centric - no guarantees that it will run at time intervals.
来源：https://stackoverflow.com/questions/13447682/adding-columns-dynamically-to-salesforce-reports