[SalesForce] Losing @ mentions in apex trigger on FeedItem

I have developped a apex trigger on FeedItem after insert. The purpose is to append an hashtag to the body of the post when certain criteria are met. Everything works very well except that any mention in the body of the post becomes plain text. Existing hashtags and the one I append are treated like hashtags.

I type the following post text

This is a post for @[Derek Hughes] to read.

Without the trigger in operation this creates a post with a proper mention of Derek Hughes (hyperlinked) and shows up on my Chatter Feed:

This is a post for Derek Hughes to read.

With the trigger this creates a post like this:

This is a post for @Derek Hughes to read. I added this #tag in my trigger."

Where the @Derek Hughes is plain text (but wiht out the square brackets) but the #tag is a proper post hashtag (hyperlinked)

The simplified code is as follows (it appends the tag to all posts and exhibits the problem):

trigger FeedItemTagger on FeedItem (before insert) {
      for (FeedItem fi : trigger.new) {
              fi.body = fi.body + ' I added this #tag in my trigger.';
              }
      }

Has anyone tried something like this before?

Any ideas on how to prevent the @ mentions being converted into text.

Thanks
Derek

Best Answer

Hashtags are parsed out of plain text, but you need to use the Connect (Chatter API) or REST API to post mentions.

I've answered a similar question here, which might help.

Copy the FeedBodyParser Utility Class from http://developer.force.com/cookbook/recipe/connect-in-apex-pilot

Then to post a mention simply use

ConnectApi.FeedItemInput feedItemInput = FeedBodyParser.convertToFeedItemInput('Hello @[Ritesh Aswaney](user:005i0000000nEVV)');      
ConnectApi.ChatterFeeds.postFeedItem(null, ConnectApi.FeedType.News, 'me', feedItemInput, null);

Related Solutions

[SalesForce] Retrieve UserId of @mention user from chatter post in Apex

You can use the new Chatter API in Apex to do this. It's in developer preview currently and is on by default in all Developer Edition orgs. (Note: It went GA in Summer '13.)

Here's an example of how to use it:

String communityId = null;
String feedItemId = 'YOUR_FEEDITEM_ID';

ConnectApi.FeedItem feedItem = ConnectApi.ChatterFeeds.getFeedItem(communityId, feedItemId);
List<ConnectApi.MessageSegment> messageSegments = feedItem.body.messageSegments;
for (ConnectApi.MessageSegment messageSegment : messageSegments) {
    if (messageSegment instanceof ConnectApi.MentionSegment) {
        ConnectApi.MentionSegment mentionSegment = (ConnectApi.MentionSegment) messageSegment;
        System.debug('Mentioned user name: ' + mentionSegment.name);
        System.debug('Mentioned user id: ' + mentionSegment.user.id);
    }
}

Link: API documentation for the ConnectApi.ChatterFeeds class.

[SalesForce] Create Chatter Post and @mention User in Trigger

The only way to @mention someone in apex is using the ConnectApi (AKA Chatter in apex) and not by just creating a FeedItem in apex. You'll need to refactor most everything in your code around the posting to Chatter. Here is a code sample of a text post with a mention borrowed from an example that Jeff Douglas has on his blog:

// makes a simple chatter text post to the specified user from the running user 
public static void mentionTextPost(Id userId, Id userToMentionId, String postText) { 

   ConnectApi.MessageBodyInput messageInput = new ConnectApi.MessageBodyInput();
   messageInput.messageSegments = new List();

   // add some text before the mention
   ConnectApi.TextSegmentInput textSegment = new ConnectApi.TextSegmentInput();
   textSegment.text = 'Hey ';
   messageInput.messageSegments.add(textSegment);

   // add the mention
   ConnectApi.MentionSegmentInput mentionSegment = new ConnectApi.MentionSegmentInput();
   mentionSegment.id = userToMentionId;
   messageInput.messageSegments.add(mentionSegment);

   // add the text that was passed
   textSegment = new ConnectApi.TextSegmentInput();
   textSegment.text = postText;
   messageInput.messageSegments.add(textSegment);

   ConnectApi.FeedItemInput input = new ConnectApi.FeedItemInput();
   input.body = messageInput;

   // post it
   ConnectApi.ChatterFeeds.postFeedItem(null, ConnectApi.FeedType.UserProfile, userId, input, null);

}

Lastly, it's worth noting that you can only post as the running user. It's not possible to post on anyone else's behalf.

With credit to Jeff, posted on his blog here, Chatter for Apex Code Examples

Related Topic

[SalesForce] FeedItem Trigger – Parse Mentions