Long Text Area truncated when saving a record

[dlisinski]

When using Mass Editor in a list view that contains a Salesforce Long Text Area, there is the possibility that the data in that field will be truncated even if it is not changed the by the end user. The simplest way to replicate this is to have an object created with a name, long text area and a checkbox. Then go through the following:

1. Create several records in this object with the value in the Long Text Area as something >255 characters
2. Create a list view with all 3 columns and load all the records
3. You will see the long text area value displayed with some text and then an ellipsis (...) at the end
4. Click the Mass Editor link
5. Change the checkbox on all of the records
6. Save the changes
7. You will see the display of the records change for the long text area
8. If you open any of the records, you will see the data in the long text area has been truncated and has an ellipsis at the end

This is a real problem when you want to deactivate a bunch of records because it will update the long text data when all you want to do is update the checkbox for active/inactive.

[dlisinski]

Here is a series of screenshots that show the flow. First, the record in the list with the long text area shown and the ellipsis in this list view

[dlisinski]

If you open the record, you see the Event Data is quite long

[dlisinski]

Cancel out of that, back to the list view, click Mass Editor and choose that record and un-check the Active? field

[dlisinski]

Press Save in Mass Editor and the record is now displayed very differently in the list view

[dlisinski]

If you open the record, you will see now that it has been truncated and has an ellipsis at the end. This is now a single line with no tabs or carriage returns and is 248 total characters in size

[dlisinski]

If the long text area is not in the list view, this issue does not happen.