How do I generate a unique ID?

How do I do X?
1

Hi all,

I need to generate unique IDs. Starting with “REF” as prefix, and it has to be followed up by numbers starting from “000001” and gets increased by 1 each time. (E.g : REF000001…REF000002)

This has to be triggered by a button click every time when clicked and displayed on a pop-up like a message.

2

Hey! I think this can be done using storeValue.

I am curious though, are going to store these values in DB? And, do you want continuity in these IDs across different sessions?

3

I’ll be storing this in a DB after generating it, will not be continuing with other sessions.

Can you direct me on how I can do it through storeValue? I’m clueless as to how sequence generation are handled. Would appreciate the help.

4

So, there is no standard way to do this. Although here is one workaround -

  1. Create a JS Object with a init function.
  2. In this function initialize the id value like - storeValue(‘uniqueId’, 0). And set it to run on page load.
  3. Now, every time you need to generate new id, you can do it like -
getNewId: () => {
  let id = appsmith.store.uniqueId + 1;
  storeValue('uniqueId', id);
  return `REF${id}`
}
5

Is there a way to do this so that the ID persists across different sessions?

6

@vroybal If the goal here is to continue generating IDs where the last session left off: I would suggest saving the most recent value to a database when it’s generated. You could then load the value on page load to always stay up to date. I do wonder if this could cause problems in case you have more than one user using the app at a time.

7

Thanks! Do you have any ideas how I would initialize the first value?

8

@vroybal you can also use our custom JS libs feature to install the UUID library and generate a unique ID using {{UUID.generate()}}

9

Thanks! That is very helpful.