To create a class in
Salesforce:
- From Setup, enter Apex Classes in the Quick Find
box, then select Apex
Classes.
- Click New.
-
Click Version Settings to specify the version of Apex and the API used with this
class. If your organization has installed managed
packages from the AppExchange, you
can also specify which version of each managed package to use with
this class. Use the default values for all versions. This associates
the class with the most recent version of Apex and the API, as well as
each managed package. You
can specify an older version of a managed package if you want to access
components or functionality that differs from the most recent package
version. You can specify an older version of Apex and the API to maintain
specific behavior.
- In the class editor, enter the Apex code
for the class. A single class can be up to 1 million characters in length, not
including comments, test methods, or classes defined using @isTest.
- Click Save to save your changes and return
to the class detail screen, or click Quick Save to save your changes and continue editing your class. Your Apex class must
compile correctly before you can save your class.
Classes can also be automatically generated from a WSDL by clicking Generate from WSDL. See SOAP Services: Defining a Class from a WSDL Document.
Once saved, classes can be invoked through class
methods or variables by other Apex code, such
as a trigger.
The Apex Class Editor
When editing
Visualforce or
Apex, either
in the
Visualforce development mode footer or from Setup, an editor is available with
the following functionality:
- Syntax highlighting
- The editor automatically applies syntax highlighting for keywords
and all functions and operators.
- Search (
)
- Search enables you to search for text within the current page,
class, or trigger. To use search, enter a string in the Search textbox and click Find Next.
- To replace a found search string with another string, enter the
new string in the Replace textbox and click replace to replace just that instance, or Replace All to replace that instance and all other instances
of the search string that occur in the page, class, or trigger.
- To make the search operation case sensitive, select the Match Case option.
- To use a regular expression as your search string, select the Regular Expressions option. The regular expressions follow
JavaScript's regular expression rules. A search using regular expressions
can find strings that wrap over more than one line.
If you use the
replace operation with a string found by a regular expression, the
replace operation can also bind regular expression group variables
($1, $2, and so on) from the found search
string. For example, to replace an <h1> tag with an <h2> tag and
keep all the attributes on the original <h1> intact, search for <h1(\s+)(.*)> and replace it with <h2$1$2>.
- Go to line (
)
- This button allows you to highlight a specified line number. If
the line is not currently visible, the editor scrolls to that line.
- Undo (
) and Redo (
)
- Use undo to reverse an editing action and redo to recreate an
editing action that was undone.
- Font size
- Select a font size from the drop-down list to control the size
of the characters displayed in the editor.
- Line and column position
- The line and column position of the cursor is displayed in the
status bar at the bottom of the editor. This can be used with go to
line (
) to quickly navigate through the editor.
- Line and character count
- The total number of lines and characters is displayed in the status
bar at the bottom of the editor.