Identifying users

These are the different mechanisms for identifying employees in Skovik:

• The Skovik user ID, the id field on a user resource (defined by us, will be unique).
• The employee's primary email, the primary_email field on a user resource (required; must be unique).
• The employee's external identifier, external_identifier field on a user resource (optional; must be unique).
• A custom field with an employee ID (optional).
• An external metadata field (optional; rarely used).

Although somewhat overlapping, each of them serve a different purpose.

• A Skovik user ID is assigned to every user in the system. These are unique and immutable, so a single user will always have the same ID.
• The Skovik user email is used to sign in, and for communication about events within the app. It can also be used to identify a single user. However, emails are not stable (people get married and change their name), so using them to identify users is discouraged. Instead, rely on a stable identifier such as the Skovik assigned ID or an external identifier.
• The (optional) external identifier must be unique and can be set via the API as well as through the UI. This field is searchable in Skovik and will be shown on reports. If your company has globally unique employee IDs or numbers, it's a good idea to populate this field with them.
• Most companies will setup a custom field with an employee ID. Custom fields are used in the bookkeeping flow, to assign bookkeeping transactions or events to individual users. These values will typically be aligned with employee IDs used in payroll and bookkeeping software.
• External metadata fields are only visible via the API and can be used to simplify certain integration scenarios. They are not needed for most integrations scenarios, but can sometimes be useful.