Hi, I’d like to request a User Lookup field in Grist.
I’m a little surprised that the built-in user table is largely restricted to the installation admin, particularly because one of the showcased use cases for Grist is task/ticket management. In an enterprise environment, being able to associate records directly with users is a pretty fundamental requirement.
I also noticed that Grist supports SCIM, which is great for automating user provisioning and deactivation. However, I’m struggling to understand why an additional, manually maintained user table would be necessary to actually reference those users in a document.
For example, if SCIM automatically provisions and deactivates users, ideally a table should be able to have a column that references those users directly. Otherwise, you have to create a second table containing user information, determine who should be included in it, keep it synchronized, and maintain that relationship yourself. That introduces unnecessary maintenance and, more importantly, creates another opportunity for the user list to become inaccurate.
Ideally, the User Lookup field would default to users who have access to the current document, with the ability to further refine the available users using additional conditions. For example, you could limit the lookup to users with a particular role, team, department, or other attribute.
I’ve attached screenshots from Airtable as an example of the functionality I’m referring to. Since Grist is positioned as an alternative to Airtable and is also looking to serve enterprise customers, I think this is an important capability to consider.
Am I misunderstanding how Grist is intended to handle this today, or is there a reason the built-in user table cannot be exposed as a lookup/reference field?
