# When do I call identify and anonymize in a Vue app with Pinia auth?

Asked by kenji_dev on 2026-08-08. Tags: vue, identity, auth.

I keep login state in a Pinia store with the usual login and logout actions, and
I want to hook identity in the right place so a user carries their profile after
login and gets cleared on logout.

Concretely, which store action does each SDK call belong in, and what value does
identify actually expect? I want to pass the right thing the first time rather
than discover it at runtime.

## 2 answers

### Answer from Priya Nair (2026-08-09)

Map it straight onto the two actions you already have. In the login action,
once you know who the user is, call `croct.identify('<userId>')`. In the logout
action, call `croct.anonymize()`. That is the whole hook.

```ts
// in your auth store
async function login(credentials) {
    const user = await api.login(credentials);
    croct.identify(user.id);
}

function logout() {
    api.logout();
    croct.anonymize();
}
```

The nice part is identity resolution links the anonymous profile to the
identified one, so the activity from before they logged in is not lost, it
carries over to the identified profile.

### Answer from lucas_ts (2026-08-10)

One gotcha to save you a debugging session: identify takes a string user id
and only a string. If you pass a number straight from your database (a bigint
or an integer primary key) you get an "Invalid user id" error. Coerce it with
`String(user.id)` before the call.

Also worth noting so you do not trip on it later: the `userId` and `token` init
options are mutually exclusive. If you are already handing the SDK a signed
token at init you should not also set `userId`, and vice versa. Pick one path
and stick with it.

#### Reply from kenji_dev (2026-08-11)

The string thing would absolutely have bitten me, our ids are numeric.
Wrapping in String and wiring both calls into the store actions now.