[SalesForce] Deep clone parent and children without using Apex – possible

You could leverage the power of External Ids to join up the objects and use the sObject Clone Method. External Ids let you dynamically match the records, without having to explicitly set the ids of the parent records being created in the clone.

Let's take the example of Account -> Opportunity -> Opportunity Product

List<Account> accts = new List<Account>{};
List<Opportunity> opptys = new List<Opportunity>{};
List<OpportunityLineItem> olis = new List<OpportunityLineItem>{};

Account acc = [Select Id, Name .... from Account];

Account accNew = acc.clone(false, true); //See sObject Clone Method
accNew.ExternalId__c = acc.Name + Datetime.now(); // set unique external Id
accts.add(accNew);

for(Opportunity opp : [Select Id, Name, ... (Select Id, ... from OpportunityLineItems) from Opportunity where AccountId = :acc.Id]){
Opportunity newOpp = opp.clone(false, true);
newOpp.ExternalId__c = opp.Name + Datetime.now(); //set unique external id

newOpp.Account = new Account(ExternalId__c = accNew.ExternalId__c); //set parent ref

opptys.add(newOpp);

for(OpportunityLineItem oli : opp.OpportunityLineItems){

OpportunityLineItem oliNew = oli.clone(false, true);
oliNew.Opportunity = new Opportunity(ExternalId__c = newOpp.ExternalId__c); //set parent

olis.add(oliNew);
}
}
}
}

insert accts;
upsert opptys; //upsert matches to accounts using external id
upsert olis; //upsert matches to opportunities using external id

You can try this, but your milage may vary:

1. Get Apache Ant and the Migration Tool.
2. Create a package.xml file that retrieves your custom object.
3. Retrieve your custom object.
4. Rename the file in src/objects that is the current object.
5. Modify the file itself to reflect the new name, label, etc.
6. Modify src/package.xml to reflect the new custom object.
7. Deploy this new object; all fields will be cloned and the entire object created.
8. Create the master-detail relationship, tab, etc, using the UI.

This technique is effective when the custom object has more than about 20 fields or so, from a time-consumption perspective.