Five ways Heroku AppLink Enhances Salesforce Development Capabilities
Summary
Heroku AppLink now integrates Heroku directly into Salesforce, allowing developers to extend their orgs with scalable, secure backend compute beyond traditional Apex and Flow limits. It enables use of popular programming languages like Python, Java, and Node.js, giving more flexibility for complex logic and external integrations. This makes it easier to build powerful, multi-language apps within Salesforce’s ecosystem while honoring user context and security. Heroku AppLink also supports additional data storage and AI services close to your Salesforce data, enhancing your options for innovative solutions.
Takeaways
- Extend Salesforce compute using Heroku AppLink to bypass some governor limits.
- Leverage multiple programming languages for backend logic within Salesforce ecosystem.
- Run Heroku AppLink code in Salesforce user context to maintain security and permissions.
- Securely manage external integrations with Heroku AppLink’s connection management.
- Enhance solutions with additional data storage and AI services through Heroku.
Over the years through this blog I have enjoyed covering various advancements in Salesforce APIs, Apex, Flow, and more recently, Agentforce. While I have featured Heroku quite a bit – despite it being a Salesforce offering, the reality has been that access to Heroku for a Salesforce developer has felt like plugging in another platform – not just because on the surface its DX is different from SFDX, but because in a more material sense, it has not been integrated with the rest of the platform and its existing tools – in the same way Apex and Flow are. Requiring you to do the integration plumbing before you can access its value. Now with a new “free” Heroku AppLink add-on , Heroku has now been tangibly integrated by Salesforce into the Salesforce platform – it and code deployed to it even sits under the Setup menu . So now it is finally time to reflect on what Heroku brings to the party! This blog starts a series on what this new capability means for Salesforce development.