Report Inline Editing is a great feature where users are able to edit the data (multi fields and multi rows) easily via report. The same thing can be done via list view, but more flexible than list view:
- Not all users able to create/edit public list view
- Need to add record type as a filter in list view if the object has multiple record type
- List view inline editing does not support controlling or dependent picklists
So, the report is a perfect option to cover the above issues. Report inline editing also honors the user has the right permissions to edit the data, only when these conditions are met for Object Permissions, Field Level Security, and Page Layout.
- Users have edit access to the associated object.
- Users have edit access to the associated field.
- The associated field is included and editable in the page layout assigned to the user profile.
However, not all fields are supported by report inline editing, e.g. Opportunity Amount, for complete reference, check out this article Updating Multiple Fields Inline on the Report Run Page in Lightning Experience.
As always, nothing is perfect in this world and Salesforce's great community has put some ideas to make this feature better:
- Reports - Inline Editing all Text fields (long/rich) (840 points)
- Report Inline Editing - Permission Sets (730 points)
- Inline Editing on Joined Reports (150 points)
- Report inline edit be assigned in profiles (70 points)
Issues
There is a minor issue related to data validation, e.g. you add a validation rule to maintain a business rule, however, if the system is unable to edit the record because of that rule, the system does not show clearly what is the cause of the error.
Another issue related to this Report Inline Editing: Dependent Field Requirement Should Match Record Pages (90 points), in summary, if the dependent field is marked as mandatory in page layout, however, no values of the dependent field are assigned to a value in the controlling field, inline report editing still requires the user to select a value, although no value is available in the dropdown too.
Reference:
- Updating Multiple Fields Inline on the Report Run Page in Lightning Experience
- Considerations for Inline Editing in a List View in Lightning Experience
