# SKA Unique Identifiers

`ska-ser-skuid` is a monorepo containing a Python library and TypeScript package for
generating **SKA Unique Identifiers (SKUIDs)**

![](../skuid-definition-PI30.excalidraw.svg)

Each SKUID contains:

- a **3–5 character entity-type prefix** (e.g. `sbd`, `eb`, `txn`)
- a **63-bit [Snowflake integer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowflake_ID)** encoding a millisecond-precision timestamp,
  a 10-bit generator ID, and an 11-bit random suffix — rendered as a [Crockford Base32](https://www.crockford.com/base32.html) string

Two forms are supported:

| Form  | Pattern                              | Example                          |
|-------|--------------------------------------|----------------------------------|
| Short | `type-<base32>`                      | `sbd-6txs9jhxnk7`                |
| Long  | `type-<gen>-<YYYYMMDD>-<base32>`     | `sbd-986-20260218-6txs9jhxnk7`   |

The long form embeds the generator ID and date-of-minting as human-readable fields, and is designed to be backwards-compatible with earlier forms of SKUIDs, both forms carry the same information and we can convert freely between the two representations.

---

```{toctree}
:maxdepth: 1
:caption: Releases
:hidden:

CHANGELOG.md
```

```{toctree}
:maxdepth: 2
:caption: Guides

usage/python
usage/js
```

```{toctree}
:maxdepth: 2
:caption: API Reference

api/python
api/js
```
---

## Indices and tables

- {ref}`genindex`
- {ref}`modindex`
- {ref}`search`