# /users/by-external/ not working

**URL:** <https://meta.discourse.org/t/users-by-external-not-working/57401>\
**Category:** Support\
**Created:** [February 15, 2017, 4:09am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/users-by-external-not-working/57401 "2017-02-15T04:09:44Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 9

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**Author:** ![Biarity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/biarity/32/121215_2.png) [@Biarity](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Biarity)\
**Post date:** [February 15, 2017, 8:18am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/users-by-external-not-working/57401/9 "2017-02-15T08:18:36Z")

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Seems I was confused by the term `external_id` since it was included in the data sent by discourse during SSO. Apparently it’s supposed to be external to me, not to discourse (which makes sense now).

Calling `GET /admin/users/:user-id` (where `user-id` is the `external-id` given by discourse earlier) works well.

On a side note, is there a way of doing this without having to supply the API key? That would make integration with my client easier.

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_[View the full topic](https://meta.discourse.org/t/users-by-external-not-working/57401)._