ApexDevNotes

Developer sidebar for Salesforce: Apex notes, JSON, Custom Labels, Metadata, CMDT, Test Coverage & more.

ApexDevNotes — The Ultimate Developer Sidebar for Salesforce Built by a Salesforce developer, for Salesforce developers. ApexDevNotes is a powerful, context-aware Chrome Extension that transforms your Salesforce Developer Console experience. Instead of juggling sticky notes, Notepad files, and browser tabs while working on Apex code, you get a sleek intelligent sidebar that lives right inside your Developer Console — always at hand, never in the way. The sidebar activates automatically when you open a supported file (Apex Class, Trigger, Visualforce Page or Component) and disappears when you switch away. Every tool runs locally inside your browser, with API calls going only to your own Salesforce org. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 📝 FEATURE 1 — PER-FILE APEX NOTES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Every Apex Class, Trigger, VF Page and Component gets its own dedicated note. ✦ Auto-saves as you type — no save button needed. Kicks in 650ms after your last keystroke. ✦ Scoped per file AND per org — sandbox notes are completely separate from production. ✦ Loads instantly on tab switch — open InvoiceTrigger and its notes appear immediately. ✦ Persistent across sessions — close the browser, restart, come back. Notes are waiting. ✦ Download Code — export the full source of any open class or trigger as a .cls or .trigger file. ✦ Export/Import — back up all notes for an org as JSON and restore them on any machine. Use cases: → Document the "why" behind complex logic → Track what you changed in this session and why → Leave reminders: "Don't rename this method — it's called by the nightly batch job" → Note edge cases found during testing ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ {} FEATURE 2 — JSON BEAUTIFIER ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Stop pasting JSON into random online formatters. Works entirely in-browser — no data leaves your machine. ✦ Format — paste any minified JSON and get clean, indented output with syntax highlighting. ✦ Minify — collapse to a single compact line for API calls or Apex string literals. ✦ Validate — get the exact error and character position for invalid JSON. ✦ Copy output with one click. Ctrl+Enter to format instantly. Perfect for Salesforce API responses, Connected App config, Platform Event payloads, and integration debugging. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🏷 FEATURE 3 — CUSTOM LABELS EXPLORER ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Search, view and edit Custom Labels without leaving the Developer Console. ✦ Partial name search — type "Error" and find all labels containing that string. ✦ Each result card shows: API Name, Master Label, full value, language, category and record ID. ✦ One-click copy — copy API name (for Apex code) or the full value separately. ✦ Inline edit and save — click ✏, edit the value directly, click Save. Updates via Tooling API immediately. No Setup navigation, no page refresh. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🔎 FEATURE 4 — OBJECT METADATA EXPLORER ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Field API names, data types and picklist values for any object — in under a second. ✦ Type any object name — Account, Invoice__c, OpportunityLineItem, or any standard or custom object. ✦ Every field shows: API Name (click to copy), Label, Data Type badge, Required indicator. ✦ Picklist values — all active values shown as chips directly on the field row. ✦ Live search — filter fields as you type, matching both API Name and Label. ✦ Required-only filter — toggle to show only non-nullable fields. Perfect for building insert statements. ✦ Results cached 5 minutes — switching tabs and returning doesn't trigger a redundant API call. ✦ Works for any object your user profile can access — standard, custom, external, big objects. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 📊 FEATURE 5 — APEX TEST COVERAGE DASHBOARD ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Real-time org-wide Apex test coverage — smarter and faster than the Developer Console view. ✦ Org-wide bar — overall coverage % at a glance: green ≥75%, amber 50–74%, red below 50%. ✦ Stats grid — passed, failed, and total class counts as metric cards. ✦ Per-class breakdown — every class listed with coverage bar, percentage, covered/uncovered lines. ✦ Test classes auto-excluded — classes with "Test" in their name filtered out automatically. ✦ Filtering and sorting: → Quick buttons: All / ✓ Passed / ✗ Failed → Sort: lowest/highest coverage, A→Z, Z→A → Coverage threshold: filter "less than 75%" or "greater than 80%" → Live name search with filtered count display ✦ Export to Excel — downloads an .xlsx of the current filtered view with Coverage and Summary sheets. ✦ Auto-loads on first tab open. Refresh button fetches latest results after running tests. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🗂 FEATURE 6 — CUSTOM METADATA EXPLORER ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Inspect Custom Metadata Type records directly — no SOQL, no Setup navigation. ✦ Type any __mdt name or click ⋯ to browse all types in your org with autocomplete. ✦ Dynamic schema discovery — fields are fetched via describe API, not hardcoded. Works for every CMDT. ✦ Each record expands to show a clean table: Field Label, API Name (click to copy), Value. ✦ Boolean values colour-coded green/red. Empty fields hidden automatically. ✦ Live search across all field values simultaneously. ✦ Sort by Label A→Z / Z→A or API Name. ✦ Results cached 5 minutes for fast re-opening. ✦ Read-only — configuration data is safe from accidental edits. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⎘ FEATURE 7 — SESSION ID COPY ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ The session strip sits below the header, visible across all tabs. ✦ Copy SID — copies the full session ID (OrgId!Token) for use as Authorization: Bearer in Postman, curl, or any API client. ✦ Copy Frontdoor URL — copies the complete frontdoor.jsp?sid=... URL. Paste in any browser to log into the org instantly without entering credentials. The session ID is read from the Salesforce sid HttpOnly cookie via the background service worker. Never stored, never logged — used only at the moment you click Copy. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ⚙ FEATURE 8 — SETTINGS & PERSONALISATION ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ✦ Themes — Light, Dark, SF Classic, Midnight, Forest, Rose. Auto follows system. ✦ Accent colour — 8 presets or any custom hex via colour picker. ✦ Transparency — 50% to 100% opacity. ✦ Font size — 10px to 16px for the notes editor. ✦ Sidebar width — drag the left edge freely, or set precisely in Settings. ✦ Animation speed — Slow, Normal, Fast, or None. ✦ Auto-save delay — 200ms to 2000ms. ✦ Auto-open — open sidebar automatically when a supported file is detected. ✦ Compact mode — denser layout for smaller screens. ✦ Keyboard shortcut — Alt+Shift+N to toggle. Customise at chrome://extensions/shortcuts. ✦ Developer Settings (password-protected) — enable or disable console logs for debugging. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🔒 PRIVACY ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ✦ No data collection — zero analytics, telemetry, or personal information collected. ✦ No external servers — no infrastructure to breach. ✦ Local-only storage — notes and settings live in chrome.storage.local on your own device. ✦ API calls stay in your org — every call goes directly to your Salesforce org. No proxies. ✦ Inactive on non-Salesforce pages — completely dormant everywhere else. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🌐 MULTI-ORG & CONTEXT-AWARE ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ✦ Multi-org — notes are namespaced by org hostname. Sandbox and production always separate. ✦ Context-aware — the toggle tab appears only for supported file types: .cls, .apxc, .trigger, .apxt, .page, .component, .resource. Hidden entirely on Logs, Tests, and blank panels. ✦ Unsaved change handling — toggle stays visible even when a file has unsaved modifications. ✦ Draggable tab — drag the toggle to any vertical position on the screen. Position saved. ✦ Pin mode — keep the sidebar open permanently while working. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🛠 TECHNICAL ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ✦ Chrome Manifest V3 — latest extension platform for security and performance. ✦ Shadow DOM — zero CSS conflicts with Salesforce Lightning Design System. ✦ SPA-aware — detects Salesforce navigation via History API patching, MutationObserver, and fallback polling. ✦ No performance impact — debounced saves, minimal DOM observation, lightweight polling. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 💡 WHY DEVELOPERS LOVE APEXDEVNOTES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ "I need to remember what this batch job does" → Write a note. It's there every time you open that class. "What's the API name of that picklist field on Invoice?" → Object Metadata Explorer. Type the object, find the field, click to copy. Done in 3 seconds. "The integration team sent me this JSON payload and I can't read it" → JSON Beautifier. Paste, Ctrl+Enter, formatted. "What's our current test coverage before I deploy?" → Coverage Dashboard. Click Refresh, filter to classes below 75%, export to Excel. "I need to quickly update this Custom Label for a hotfix" → Custom Labels tab. Search, click edit, save. Done without leaving the console. "What are the field values in our SAP_Config__mdt records?" → Custom Metadata Explorer. Type the type name, every record and field value appears instantly. "I need to test this API call in Postman but I don't have a session token" → Copy SID. One click. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 📋 SUPPORTED FILE TYPES ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ .cls / .apxc → Apex Class .trigger / .apxt → Apex Trigger .page → Visualforce Page .component → Visualforce Component .resource → Static Resource ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🔑 KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Alt + Shift + N → Toggle sidebar open/closed (customisable) Ctrl + Enter → Format JSON (JSON tab) Enter → Search Custom Labels Enter → Fetch object metadata Enter → Fetch Custom Metadata records Customise the toggle shortcut at chrome://extensions/shortcuts ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ❓ FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Q: Does this work with sandboxes and scratch orgs? A: Yes. Notes are automatically separated by hostname — sandbox and production always isolated. Q: Does the extension slow down the Developer Console? A: No. Debounced saves, throttled observation, no blocking of the main thread. Q: What happens to my notes if I uninstall the extension? A: Deleted with all extension data. Export notes as JSON from Settings first if needed. Q: Can I use this across multiple orgs in different browser tabs? A: Yes. Each tab is independent, scoped to its own org hostname. Q: Does the Custom Label edit feature work in all orgs? A: It requires API access and Custom Label edit permission on your profile. Descriptive error shown if not. Q: Is there a limit on how many notes I can store? A: Chrome's storage.local has a 10MB limit. Since notes are plain text, you can store thousands. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🆓 FREE FOREVER ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ApexDevNotes is completely free — no paid tiers, no subscription, no account required. Install it, use it, share it with your Salesforce team. Built by Shubham Vaishnav — Salesforce Developer. Blog: salesforceforfresher.wordpress.com LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/theshubhamvsnv