Version 8.0 Doc Notes

See also:

• Current version release notes for changes in this version of the platform.
• Release Notes for all versions.

Terminology Revision: "Sys Admin"

Previously, the term "System Admin" was ambiguous. It now has only one meaning.

That term now applies to someone who has the role of Sys Admin in the platform (someone who managers users, permissions, and company information). The term Installer has been reintroduced to designate a person who installs, configures, monitors, and maintains a standalone instance of the platform's Installable Version. (A platform admin, is someone who manages multiple templates, whether they are working in the cloud or on an installed version.)

Wiki Conventions

A new Wiki Conventions page has been added to the Help pages. Its contents are reproduced here:

• To make it easier to go from the GUI to the Wiki, the Wiki tries to have a page for each section heading in the GUI. In most cases, it should be possible to search on a section heading, to find the material you're looking for.

• From any given page, you can use "What links here" to get more information. (Links tell you where material is used, "transclusions" point to pages that provide a larger context.)

• When you follow a link to a Wiki page, it sometimes raises the question, "Where is this section in the GUI?" To help answer that question, pages that correspond to GUI sections have a GUI path at the top. Those paths tell you what actions you take to get to that section of the GUI. The general format of a path looks like this:

Do this > Then this > And this

This sample shows the kinds of the things you might see in a GUI path:

Item > /Tab\ > _Link_ > {choice} > [Button]

where:

• Item - Typically an item in the navigation pane. Could also be a menu item.
• /Tab\ - A tab you click __TBD: Not Used__
• _Link_ - A link on the page that you click __TBD: Not Used__
• {choice} - A selection you make or a value you enter
• [Button] - A button you click

Note: The items marked "not used" look good when displayed in TT font, as above. They do not look as good in actual use, with a normal font.

REST API Changes

• To make the APIs more consistent and more readily usable, Fields definitions are now found in the same place on all pages, after the resource descriptions but (generally) before code samples.

Sample Code Changes

These changes have been to code samples, to make the samples work in Eclipse, when using the Eclipse Plugin:

• An explicit import statement for platform APIs has been added to all code samples:

import com.platform.api.*;

(That statement imports the Functions class, in particular.

• Any class that uses the platform's Java Beans has had an additional statement added:

import com.platform.beans.*;

• Explicit invocations have been added for all platform operations defined in the Functions class. For example:

• Functions.addRecord(...)
• Functions.debug("...")
• Functions.getParametersInstance()
• etc.

For more on these changes, see the Release Notes.

Terminology Changes

"System Objects": Current and Future

In version 8.0, the term system objects has been replaced by two new categories of object:

New Term	Description
CRM Objects	Pre-defined objects that are installed as part of the platform's CRM application. For example: Accounts, Contacts.
Built-in Objects	Pre-defined objects that come with the platform. For example: Users, Teams, and Roles.

Both of those categories include objects that have special, pre-defined capabilities, but which are less customizable than the Custom Objects that are created when new applications are developed or installed.

In a future release, those objects are due to be replaced with more customizable cousins. At that point, the terminology distinctions will disappear, and the platform will contain simply "objects".

Corrections

• The REST APIs were previously described as returning XML, by default. That statement has been corrected. They return JSON, by default. (But some browsers add an accept-header that specifies XML--notably Firefox.)