Hi! I found a workaround that’s helpful for me, so I thought I’d share. If someone has an easier way to do this, please let me know! Apologies if this has already been posted, I didn’t find it after a bit of searching.
The problem I was trying to solve was that when updating a record, a field can be named using its friendly name (e.g. “First Name”), but then if I change it later, even a little bit, my API integration will break. Each field also has a unique ID, prefaced by fld, but I wasn’t aware of any way to actually find that name.
Well, it turns out that you can for most fields, with a little trickery:
Edit: See drassi’s post below for an easier way to do this.
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In the GUI, create a new field, and make it a formula. In the formula, refer to the field that you want to know the ID of. (For instance, if you want to know the ID of the “First Name” field, make your formula “{First Name}”.)
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Delete the field that you want to know the name of. Now, the formula field will have a red error icon, and when you pull up your formula, the formula will say “{column_value_fldxxxxxxxxxxxx}”. The fldxxxxxxxxxxxx part is your field ID.
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Undo the field deletion. Everything will be back the way it was before, nothing will have been harmed by temporarily deleting the field.
This works for any field except the first column, which can’t be deleted as it is the primary key.
Now, you can refer to fldxxxxxxxxxxxx in your API calls and it won’t matter if it gets renamed!
