Understanding the Force.com Metadata API
The Metadata API allows the direct manipulation of objects, page layouts, tabs, and most of the other configurable features in Force.com. By using the Metadata API, you can automate many of the click-intensive tasks commonly performed in the Force.com IDE or in the native Web user interface, such as the creation of database objects and fields.
This section provides an introduction to the Metadata API in two parts, described here:
1. Overview—The Metadata API is different from the Enterprise API in two major ways. First, it can operate on objects in memory or using zip files containing many objects represented as XML files. Second, its operations are asynchronous, returning immediately with a result identifier to use for follow-up calls to check the status.
2. Getting started with the Metadata API—Walk through a sample of calling the Metadata API to create a new object using Java.
Note
The details of how the Metadata API operates on each type of metadata in Force.com are outside the scope of this book. Consult the Force.com Metadata API Developer’s Guide, found at www.salesforce.com/us/developer/docs/api_meta/index.htm, for the latest information and detailed descriptions of all the available methods of the Metadata API. Salesforce continues to expand the reach of the Metadata API in every release.