Custom attributes
Signicat IAM (SIAM) stores user and organisation attributes like name, email or address. An attribute can have one of the following categories:
- User: Apply to user profiles, like name and contact.
- Organisation: Apply to companies, like branch offices and business address.
- Membership: Apply to the relationship between a user and an organisation, like a business email address, company phone number, employee number, department or job title.
SIAM provides a default list of native attributes to address the most common scenarios. In addition to the native attributes, you can add your own custom attributes.
To manage your SIAM attributes, go to Attributes on the left menu of your SIAM platform.
Creating attributes
To customise the profiles of your users and organisation in your SIAM platform, you can define your own attributes. You can create a custom attribute by doing the following:
- Log in to your SIAM platform.
- Navigate to the Attributes page by using the left-hand menu.
- Click + Create attribute at the top right.
- On the Create attribute page, configure the fields according to the Attribute specifications table.
- Click Create to create the attribute.
After creating a new attribute, you find it displayed in the Attributes section.
When you create an attribute and set it to required, the attribute is automatically added to existing user or organisation profiles.
For membership attributes, the new attribute is displayed for existing memberships. If the attribute has no value, an administrator or user who can edit it must enter one when they next edit that membership.
Attribute specifications
Make sure to use unique attribute names for your custom attributes.
Attribute data types
Attributes support the following data types:
User attributes
User attributes store information about a person, regardless of which organisations they belong to. For example:
- Personal phone number
- Region
- Date of birth
- Preferred language
To create a user attribute, follow the steps in the Creating attributes section and select User in the Type field.
Place user attributes on forms
When you create or edit a user attribute, you can choose one or more forms on which it appears:
Form placement does not limit what an administrator can see. Administrators can view all user attributes on the user's Details tab.
To require a value and place the attribute on all three forms, turn on Required when creating or editing the attribute. SIAM automatically selects the forms and prevents you from removing them while this setting is turned on.
User attribute settings
The following settings determine how a user attribute behaves:
Invitation and self-registration forms create the user attribute value for the first time. A user can therefore enter an initial value on either form even when Editable by user is turned off.
After the value is saved, the setting controls whether the user can change it from their profile.
View and edit user attributes
Administrators can view user attributes under Users > Details. The Edit form keeps attributes read-only unless Editable by admin is turned on and the administrator has permission to update the user.
Users can view their attributes under Profile > Details. Attributes without Editable by user turned on remain read-only.
For instructions, see Viewing and editing user attributes.
Organisation attributes
Organisation attributes store information about an organisation. For example:
- Business address
- Branch number
- Chamber of commerce number
- Organisation identifier
The values belong to the organisation rather than to an individual user or membership.
To create an organisation attribute, follow the steps in the Creating attributes section and select Organisation in the Type field.
Organisation attribute settings
The Editable by user setting is not available for organisation attributes since organisations are only managed by administrators.
Set attributes when creating an organisation
When at least one organisation attribute is defined, SIAM includes all organisation attribute fields in the Create organisation form. Default values are prefilled, required values must be completed and optional values can be left blank.
The Editable by admin setting does not prevent an administrator from assigning the first value during organisation creation.
View and edit organisation attributes
To view an organisation's attributes, do the following:
- Navigate to Organisations.
- Select the organisation.
- Open the Overview tab.
SIAM displays all defined organisation attributes after the name and parent organisation fields. An administrator can assign a value to an empty attribute even when Editable by admin is turned off.
After the first value is stored, administrators can change it only when Editable by admin is turned on. SuperAdmins can always change the value.
Click Save changes to apply the updates. Every required attribute must have a value before the organisation can be saved.
Membership attributes
A membership connects a user to a specific organisation.
Membership attributes store information that is relevant only within that relationship. This means that the same user can have different values for the same attribute in different organisations.
For example, consider a user who belongs to two organisations:
- You can create a membership attribute with the display name
Company phone number. - The user can then have one company phone number in the first organisation and a different number in the second organisation.
- A personal phone number that applies to the user everywhere is better represented by a user attribute.
To create a membership attribute, follow the steps in the Creating attributes section and select Membership in the Type field.
Membership attribute settings
The following settings determine where a membership attribute value is required and who can change it:
An administrator can assign a membership attribute during an organisation invitation even when Editable by admin is turned off.
After the membership is created, the value is read-only for administrators.
Assign membership attributes during an invitation
Membership attributes are available when an administrator invites users to an organisation. They are not available for global invitations because global access does not create an organisation membership.
The Membership attributes section appears only when at least one membership attribute is defined. Required attributes must have a value, while optional attributes can be left blank.
When an invitation contains several email addresses, SIAM assigns the same membership attribute values to every user in that invitation.
For the complete invitation procedure, see Inviting users.
View membership attributes as an administrator
Administrators can view a user's membership attributes from the Memberships tab on the user details page.
The tab is displayed only when membership attributes are available for the user's organisation memberships.
SIAM groups the attributes by organisation and loads all available memberships when the user belongs to several organisations.
An Edit button is displayed for an organisation when the administrator has permission to update that membership and at least one attribute has Editable by admin turned on. Other attributes remain read-only.
For instructions, see Viewing and editing a user's membership attributes.
View membership attributes as a user
Users can view their membership attributes under Profile > Memberships.
SIAM groups the attributes by organisation and loads all of the user's memberships. The Memberships tab is hidden when the user does not belong to an organisation.
An Edit button is displayed for an organisation when at least one attribute has Editable by user turned on. Attributes without this setting remain read-only.
For instructions, see Viewing and editing your membership attributes.
Manage custom attributes through the API
You can also manage users, organisations and memberships programmatically with the SIAM SCIM API. These resources can include their custom attributes.
See the SIAM SCIM API reference for the available operations and request formats.