External objects support standard lookup relationships, which use the 18-character
Salesforce record IDs to associate related records with each other. However, data that’s stored
outside your Salesforce org often doesn’t contain those record IDs. Therefore, two special types
of lookup relationships are available for external objects: external lookups and indirect
lookups.
Required Editions
Available in: both Salesforce Classic
and Lightning Experience
Salesforce Connect is available in: Developer Edition and for an extra
cost in: Enterprise, Performance, and Unlimited Editions
Files Connect for cloud-based external data
sources is available in: Professional, Enterprise,
Performance, Unlimited, and Developer
Editions
Federated Search is available in: Enterprise,
Professional, Unlimited, and Developer Editions
External lookups and indirect lookups compare a specific field’s values on the parent object
to the relationship field’s values on the child object. When values match, the records are
related to each other.
To create an external object relationship, create a custom field on the child object with one
of the following field types. If the child is an external object, you can instead change the
field type of an existing custom field to one of the following.
Lookup Relationship
External Lookup Relationship
Indirect Lookup Relationship
This table summarizes the types of relationships that are available to external objects.
Note Federated Search supports only external lookup relationships, and the Federated Search
external object is always the parent.
Relationship
Allowed Child Objects
Allowed Parent Objects
Parent Field for Matching Records
Lookup
Standard
Custom
External
Standard
Custom
The 18-character Salesforce record ID
External lookup
Standard
Custom
External
External
The External ID standard field
Indirect lookup
External
Standard
Custom
You select a custom field with the External
ID and Unique attributes
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