Site profile doesn't appear to have access to FirstName or LastName on Leads

Question

I have created a public site to create Lead records. It seems as though the site's profile has access to the composite Name field but not the FirstName or LastName fields. Eg:

//This doesn't Work
Lead l = [SELECT Name FROM Lead LIMIT 1];
this.firstName = l.FirstName;

//This works
Lead l = [SELECT Name FROM Lead LIMIT 1];
this.name = l.Name;

The profile for this site has read and edit access for leads, it also has access to the Name field. I do not see any options for granting access to FirstName, but as it's a composite field that is to be expected. Any advice as to a good workaround or a fix for this?

Answer 1

Name is a special type of "formula field." If you want FirstName and LastName, you must explicitly query for them:

Lead l = [SELECT FirstName, LastName FROM Lead LIMIT 1];
System.debug(l.FirstName+' '+l.LastName);

This is true for all compound fields of this nature. If you don't query the individual parts, you don't get the individual parts.