What you will learn?
- in Apex get all Parent object of any Salesforce Custom or Standard Object
- Get all parent objects in apex by passing object name dynamically
- Get all parent objects of any specific object using apex. Example: Get all parent of Account Object
Apex Code
Here is a Apex method which take Child object as parameter and return map with Label and API name of all available parent objects.
public static Map<String, String> getParentObjects(String childObjectName) {
Map<String, String> mapParentObjects = new Map<String,String>();
String SobjectApiName = childObjectName;
Map<String, Schema.SObjectType> schemaMap = Schema.getGlobalDescribe();
for(Schema.SobjectField fldMap: schemaMap.get(SobjectApiName).getDescribe().fields.getMap().Values())
{
String customField = fldMap.getDescribe().getName();
if(customField.endsWith('__c') && fldMap.getDescribe().getType() == Schema.DisplayType.REFERENCE)
{
List<SObjectType> refObjs = fldMap.getDescribe().getReferenceTo();
String objectName = String.valueOf(refObjs[0]);
mapParentObjects.put(getObjectLabel(objectName), objectName);
}
}
return mapParentObjects;
}Below method used to find Label of Salesforce Object.
Method To Get Object Label
public static String getObjectLabel(String objectName) {
Map<String, SObjectType> sObjects = Schema.getGlobalDescribe();
return sObjects.get(objectName).getDescribe().getLabel();
}Get Parent Object of Salesforce Account Object
public static Map<String, String> getParentObjects() {
Map<String, SObjectType> sObjects = Schema.getGlobalDescribe();
Map<String, String> mapParentObjects = new Map<String,String>();
for(Schema.SobjectField fldMap: Opportunity.SobjectType.getDescribe().fields.getMap().Values())
{
String customField = fldMap.getDescribe().getName();
if(customField.endsWith('__c') && fldMap.getDescribe().getType() == Schema.DisplayType.REFERENCE)
{
List<SObjectType> refObjs = fldMap.getDescribe().getReferenceTo();
String objectName = String.valueOf(refObjs[0]);
mapParentObjects.put(getObjectLabel(objectName), objectName);
}
}
return mapParentObjects;
}How the code works
The method receives a child object name, reads all of its fields and collects the objects it looks up to, returning a Map of label to API name. A helper method finds the label of an object by its name.
Limits of this version
- It only checks fields ending in
__c, so standard lookups such as AccountId on Contact are missed. - It uses
refObjs[0], so for a polymorphic field only the first object is returned.
Improved method
public static Map<String, String> getParentObjects(String childObjectName) {
Map<String, String> parents = new Map<String, String>();
Schema.SObjectType childType = Schema.getGlobalDescribe().get(childObjectName);
if (childType == null) {
return parents;
}
for (Schema.SObjectField fld : childType.getDescribe().fields.getMap().values()) {
Schema.DescribeFieldResult d = fld.getDescribe();
if (d.getType() == Schema.DisplayType.REFERENCE) {
for (Schema.SObjectType refType : d.getReferenceTo()) {
Schema.DescribeSObjectResult r = refType.getDescribe();
parents.put(r.getLabel(), r.getName());
}
}
}
return parents;
}This returns standard and custom parents, handles polymorphic fields, and avoids a crash when the object name is wrong. Fields such as CreatedById and OwnerId add User to the result, so remove it if you do not need it.
FAQ
How do I call it?System.debug(getParentObjects('Contact')); returns Account, User and other parents of Contact.
