Create an `identifier` Field to the User Collection

[palisadoes]

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.

The User collection currently has a _id field. This is an internal unique identifier. Unfortunately it is not easily memorable. We need a memorable ID that an Talawa Administrator or User can use to reference themselves or other users.

It's to help provide a means for searching for someone by a member ID that you would find on a membership card

Describe the solution you'd like

1. We need to add an identifier field to the User collection
2. This field must be:
   1. memorable
   2. numeric
   3. auto-incrementing
   4. sequential
   5. immutable after applying
   6. mandatory
3. Automatically applied when the User is created in the related mutation
4. Valid tests for this must be created as part of the resolution of this issue
5. You will need to update the sample data users.json file accordingly. The data importation must succeed and the ability to navigate through the client apps must not be affected.

Describe alternatives you've considered

• N/A

Approach to be followed (optional)

• See above

Additional context

• N/A

Potential internship candidates

• Please read this if you are planning to apply for a Palisadoes Foundation internship https://github.com/PalisadoesFoundation/talawa/issues/359

[adi790uu]

Would like to work on this @palisadoes @noman2002

[github-actions[bot]]

This issue did not get any activity in the past 10 days and will be closed in 180 days if no update occurs. Please check if the develop branch has fixed it and report again or close the issue.

[palisadoes]

Unassigning due to inactivity

[shankeleven]

@palisadoes please assign this to me, would love to work

[TheLazron]

@palisadoes can I be assigned this issue?

[shankeleven]

Apologies but i am new to this repository , so i would ask for some guidance

i propose a solution to this problem could be something similar to a username in other social media websites, which goes as: we assign each user a random username(or identifier) based on the initials of his name and some random number and we offer the user the option to create their own username if they want to, and those who choose not to create one for themselves would continue with the one generated automatically. i am keeping this optional because the aim of our organisation is to cater to even those people who are not that well versed with the current technology so why create an additional hurdle for them.

please tell me if you have any opinions or some suggestions regarding this,

[palisadoes]

We want what is described in the issue.

[shankeleven]

thanks for answering . okay , i would do exactly that, but what i am curious about is if the point of the identifier is to be just memorable as otherwise we wouldn't need it as we already have _id as the unique identifier wouldn't it be more useful to have a combination of initials and numbers rather than just a numeric value as it would be easier for you to remember Palis1020 than to remember 45981020

[palisadoes]

It's to help provide a means for searching for someone by a member ID that you would find on a membership card

[nakul30]

It's to help provide a means for searching for someone by a member ID that you would find on a membership card

Hello Palisadoes, Can you assign the issue to me.

[Cioppolo14]

@nakul30 If the issue has already been assigned, please don't ask to be assigned. We want everyone to get a chance.

[nakul30]

@nakul30 If the issue has already been assigned, please don't ask to be assigned. We want everyone to get a chance.

Please assign the issue to me if not ressolved by the person whom it is assigned as i have just begun with open source

[shankeleven]

@palisadoes sir i am almost done with the issue , was just curious about one thing shall i begin the count for the identifier field from 0 itself or some number like 1000 or 10000 or even 100000 for that matter in order for most of the identifiers to be around the same digits long?

[palisadoes]

Start with 0

[github-actions[bot]]

This issue did not get any activity in the past 10 days and will be closed in 180 days if no update occurs. Please check if the develop branch has fixed it and report again or close the issue.

[Cioppolo14]

@shankeleven Is a PR coming soon?

[shankeleven]

yes ma'am hopefully by tonight otherwise tomorrow

[palisadoes]

Please note:

[shankeleven]

@palisadoes sir please review the pull request #1811

[github-actions[bot]]

This issue did not get any activity in the past 10 days and will be closed in 180 days if no update occurs. Please check if the develop branch has fixed it and report again or close the issue.

[github-actions[bot]]

This issue did not get any activity in the past 10 days and will be closed in 180 days if no update occurs. Please check if the develop branch has fixed it and report again or close the issue.

[palisadoes]

Unassigning as the PR was abandoned

[shankeleven]

@palisadoes it isn't abandoned, it was just that the linting errors were somewhat confusing because they were arriving from files i did not edit, currently my semester exams are going on , so i had thought of correcting this once they end

[palisadoes]

I've reassigned. I was reviewing long standing PRs that had no recent activity and closed yours. Sorry. We should have given a 24 hour warning. We'll remember next time.

[pranshugupta54]

Do we really need a public member ID? Is it really helpful?

• If an organization has lots of users, the member ID might become very long (like 12138 if it starts from 0), making it hard to remember.
• Starting from 0 could make it worse, causing IDs with different lengths, which could confuse users when they talk about their IDs. Usually, IDs have the same number of digits (like credit card numbers or phone numbers).
• It's not a good idea to use member IDs for searching. It's better to use email addresses because people can remember their email addresses easier than their member IDs.

[github-actions[bot]]

This issue did not get any activity in the past 10 days and will be closed in 180 days if no update occurs. Please check if the develop branch has fixed it and report again or close the issue.

[Cioppolo14]

Unassigning due to no pr or activity.

[varshith257]

@palisadoes @Cioppolo14 I would like to work on this issue.

[Cioppolo14]

@varshith257 Somehow I missed that a PR was open for this issue, I'm going to reassign @shankeleven, but if I don't get an update from them soon, you will get this next.

[palisadoes]

Unassigning due to abandoned PR