# A way for admins to edit users' external IDs

**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/a-way-for-admins-to-edit-users-external-ids/96976
**Category:** Feature
**Created:** [11 september 2018 om 19:06 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/a-way-for-admins-to-edit-users-external-ids/96976 "2018-09-11T19:06:40Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
**Showing post:** 8

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### Author: ![Falco](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/falco/32/179432_2.png) [@Falco](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Falco)
#### Post date: [22 oktober 2018 om 16:07 UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/a-way-for-admins-to-edit-users-external-ids/96976/8 "2018-10-22T16:07:04Z")

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> [@sudoman](#):
>
> However the issue here isn’t updating the user name of someone who logs in with an External ID of ‘bob’, but allowing Bob to log into the same account with the a new External ID of ‘alice’. In order to do so, it looks like the External ID of Bob’s account needs to be changed from ‘bob’ to ‘alice’.

Why are you updating the `external_id`? The `external_id` is supposed to be a immutable identifier of the user in the auth source, like the ID column from the database or a long UUID, or anything stable.

From the documentation:

> [@Setup DiscourseConnect - Official Single-Sign-On for Discourse (sso)](https://meta.discourse.org/t/setup-discourseconnect-official-single-sign-on-for-discourse-sso/13045/1):
>
> **external\_id** is any string unique to the user that will never change, even if their email, name, etc change. The suggested value is your database’s ‘id’ row number.

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_[View the full topic](https://meta.discourse.org/t/a-way-for-admins-to-edit-users-external-ids/96976)._