Alternatives for Users Table Synchronization

If the Users Table cannot always be reliably synchronized with the tenant’s SSO server, alternative mechanisms may be considered to maintain alignment between user records and identity provider data.

There are two commonly adopted patterns for maintaining sync between the SSO system and the Users Table:

Scheduled Sync Pipeline

Establish a synchronization pipeline that pulls user data from the SSO server and updates the Users Table.

  • This can be either a manual process (e.g., initiated by admin tools) or an automated one.
  • For automated sync, the cadence (hourly, daily, etc.) must be defined based on acceptable staleness and load tolerance.
  • This method is relatively straightforward but introduces a time gap between SSO changes and backend updates.

Event-Driven Pub/Sub Model

Adopt a publish/subscribe architecture, where the SSO server emits events (e.g., user created, updated, deactivated) to an exposed API endpoint on Innovapptive’s side.
  • These events are then used to update or delete user entries in the Users Table in near real-time.
  • This approach ensures better consistency and reacts instantly to user state changes.
  • However, it depends heavily on:
    • The SSO provider’s eventing capabilities
    • Proper initial sync to align existing records

    Reference: JSON Web Tokens with Public Key Signatures – Miguel Grinberg