The Salesforce Suite module for Drupal synchronizes Salesforce Objects with Drupal Content Types on a one-to-one, field-to-field basis. However, it doesn’t map an Object’s fields to a Content Type’s Taxonomy terms. After laying out a use case, I’ll share my working solution.
Example
Let’s say you want to replicate Salesforce Contact Objects as instances of a Drupal Content Type. The following Object fields map directly to fields in our Content Type.
- Name
- LeadSource
You could create a Content Type mirroring those as simple text fields. But, I have something more interesting in mind for you!
LeadSource is a Salesforce picklist that might work well as a Drupal Taxonomy. Perhaps you’d like to use it in a faceted search, or as an easy filter for a view, or use some cool module for taxonomies? Sorry, the Salesforce module can’t get you there out of the box.
The Road Taken
In August of 2013, the user mkryemadhi posted a Drupal.org issue titled Mapping drupal vocabulary terms with Salesforce field inquiring whether or not it was possible. A few others replied, also in search of a solution. About a year later, one of the module’s contributors, tauno, replied with a suggestion.
… For pulling, you would need to implement
hook_salesforce_pull_entity_value_alter()to use a term name from SF and convert that to a term id in Drupal.A custom field mapping handler could be implemented to make this all possible from the UI. Moving to the Feature Request queue.
My Solution
Here’s how I used the first part of that advice and implemented hook_salesforce_pull_entity_value_alter() to successfully map Salesforce Object fields to Drupal Taxonomy terms.
To start, I created a custom module with a function implementing the hook. Then, because I had more than one implementation of that kind, I checked the incoming Object type. If it wasn’t Contact, I skipped it. Otherwise, I used the Content Type’s mapped field to obtain the Vocabulary and either create a new term or use the existing one.
To use my solution, you’ll need to:
- Have a Content Type with a field of type Term reference.
- Create and enable a custom module containing my code, below.
- Set up a mapping from the Content Type’s field (“Drupal Field”) using Related entities, as above, to the Object’s field (“Salesforce Field”).
But, first: please note the following:
- Expect some naive Drupal / PHP mistakes. This is an excerpt from my very first Drupal module / PHP code.
- This solution hijacks the module’s concept of Related Entity; the way I went about it prevents its original, intended usage. (It’s meant more for referencing a Node from another Node.)
- I should have used a custom mapping handler and created a proper UI for it.
In the near future I hope to resolve the deficiencies in my implementation and contribute my solution back to Drupal’s Salesforce Suite community.
Code
Please note: I accidentally left out the get_drupal_field_name() function, below. Unfortunately, I no longer have access to the original codebase and am unable to provide it. If you use a debugger, or use print statements, to inspect $field_map, you may be able to come up with your own version of get_drupal_field_name().