1. Implementation Reference
  2. About Recent Items

About Recent Items

As they work in an application, salespeople see their most recent items in the Find search boxes, in the Recent Items list (accessible from the favorites icon in the global header), and in other lists.

A salesperson's recently accessed or updated records is supplied by the Recent Items API.

Scenarios for When Recent Item Relationships Occur

The application captures recent items any time a sales user interacts with a record, whether that be creating, updating, or simply viewing the record. That record then shows up in the Find box for that object. Note that recent items don't appear in other objects' Find lists. Say, for example, a salesperson creates an opportunity, that record's creation won't show up in the Activities Find list. But, they can show up in lists of values within a record, such as an account recent item showing up in the list of accounts in an opportunity.

Note: By default, the application keeps recent items in the database for 30 days. You can configure this time frame, however. See the Specify How Long to Keep Recent Items topic for more information.

These simple scenarios illustrate events that cause the Recent Item API to establish a recent items relationship with a record or with the application itself:

  • A user creates a record, such as a lead, an opportunity, or an activity like a task or appointment.

  • A user drills into the edit page of a record that's not among the recent items, for example, the user opens a task.

  • A user signs out of the application.

This scenario is a little more complex and illustrates how recent items can appear in other objects:

  • An appointment has Opportunity 1 associated with it.

  • The user edits Opportunity 2 and saves the opportunity.

  • The user goes into the same appointment and removes Opportunity 1 and clicks on the drop-down list for opportunities, to associate a different opportunity with the appointment.

  • In the appointment's drop-down list for opportunities, the application shows the last opportunity (Opportunity 2) first in the list.

If a record is created, the CREATION_DATE and CREATED_BY attributes are captured accordingly. If a record is updated, then the LAST_UPDATE_DATE and LAST_UPDATED_BY attributes are modified accordingly.

But, remember that users don't have to update a record for it to be recorded as a recent item. Whether the record is updated or not, the application always records even the viewing of a record as a recent item.