How to implement "Cancel" functionality in a VisualForce Page

Question

I know that this is how to save a record

<apex:commandButton action="{!save}" value="Save"/>

I want a button to NOT save the current record (ie. Cancel) and navigate to the list of saved record (ie. list of objects for that object type).

Something like this...

<apex:commandButton action="{!cancel}" value="Cancel"/>

Answer 1

The list view for an object is your base URL / the 3 letter prefix for your object / o, for example:

https://na1.salesforce.com/a0C/o

So you could just create an action method that returns a Pagereference with the appropriate URL and set to redirect (pr.setRedirect(true)).

Alternatively, you could use your controller as an extension to a standard controller, and just call cancel on the standard controller:

// controller extension
public class TimeSheetExtension
{
  ApexPages.standardController m_sc = null;

  public TimeSheetExtension(ApexPages.standardController sc)
  {
    m_sc = sc;
  }

  public PageReference doCancel()
  {
    return m_sc.cancel();
  }
}

// page
<apex:commandButton action="{!doCancel}" value="Cancel"/>

Note that this doesn't necessarily take you to the list view, it'll return you to the last page you were viewing before going to the VF page.

Answer 2

You should also add the immediate tag to your Cancel button, so that the form doesn't run any validation before performing the Cancel operation.

<apex:commandButton action="{!cancel}" immediate="true" value="Cancel"/>

See http://blogs.developerforce.com/developer-relations/2008/12/using-the-immediate-attribute-on-commandlinks-and-commandbuttons.html

Answer 3

One of the other answers suggested calling the standard controller's cancel action so I want to expand on that since it led me in the direction to solve my similar problem.

If you want to cancel an edit as an ajax request without refreshing the whole page, declare the action as void and don't return the page reference, but still call the 'cancel' action on the standard controll. Make sure the command button specifies the rerender attribute.

// controller extension
public class TimeSheetExtension
{
  ApexPages.standardController m_sc = null;

  public TimeSheetExtension(ApexPages.standardController sc)
  {
    m_sc = sc;
  }

  public void doCancel()
  {
    m_sc.cancel();
  }
}

// page
<apex:commandButton action="{!doCancel}" value="Cancel" rerender="container_id"/>

Answer 4

While applying cancel operation visualforce you should stop the form validation.Use below any one methods to stop the form validation based on your requirements.

Method 1:

Using html-5 in doctype in visualforce page means you should use html-formnovalidate and immediate in cancel button. For example

<apex:commandButton action="{!cancel}" value="Cancel" immediate="true" 
                    html-formnovalidate="formnovalidate" />

Method 2:

you should use immediate key word only need for stopping form validation. For Example

 <apex:commandButton action="{!cancel}" value="Cancel" immediate="true"/>