Polite request to continue supporting Bulk API 1 because its better than Bulk API 2.0 in many scenarios

[codeulike]

Currently Bulk API 2.0 is supported through the sf data upsert bulk and similar commands.

Bulk API 1 is also provided via the sf force data bulk upsert and similar commands.

The note on the documentation for the older 'force' commands here says these are "Legacy commands for backward compatibility".

I'd just like to make the point that Bulk API 1 continues to be supported by Salesforce and (more importantly) in many real-world scenarios it has a lot of advantages over Bulk API 2.0. So for me its about more than backwards compatibility, I'll choose Bulk API 1 over 2 most of the time. Because:

• In Bulk API 1, you can choose between serial and parallel - this is very important where there might be a lot of lock contention (e.g. if you've ever tried to load 1 million CampaignMember records you'll see how messy the locks can get with parallel loads)
• In Bulk API 1, you can see and download the 'results' files in the Salesforce UI. In Bulk API 2 they are hidden from the UI and only accessible via REST calls
• In Bulk API 1, you can specify a batch size (NB: you cant actually do this through salesforce cli but I'll mention it anyway because its a big advantage). When you are loading into objects with a lot of processing/flows/triggers tied to them, there are scenarios where you need to leave all the automation active and lower the batch size right down to avoid hitting limits

(actually if anyone does want to add a --batch-size flag to sf force data bulk upsert I would really appreciate it)

I havent heard anything about this project deprecating Bulk API 1 but I'd just like to pre-emptively make this point that there's lots of reasons for end users like me to prefer Bulk API 1 over Bulk API 2.0.

There are some other platforms (Microsoft Azure Data Factory for example) that have dropped support for Bulk API 1 and only support Bulk API 2 and that makes them much less useful IMHO.

Thanks

[cristiand391]

AFAIK there's no plan to deprecate bulk v1 commands (as long as the bulk v1 API is supported).

In Bulk API 1, you can choose between serial and parallel - this is very important where there might be a lot of lock contention (e.g. if you've ever tried to load 1 million CampaignMember records you'll see how messy the locks can get with parallel loads)

The API team is aware of that limitation, there's some guidelines about how to organize data and also a pilot feature for automatic record lock handling:
https://developer.salesforce.com/docs/atlas.en-us.api_asynch.meta/api_asynch/datafiles_organize_data.htm

but yeah, if none of that works then bulk v1 is the suggestion.

In Bulk API 1, you can see and download the 'results' files in the Salesforce UI. In Bulk API 2 they are hidden from the UI and only accessible via REST calls

yep, for CLI there's sf data bulk results to get bulk v2 results as CSVs.