identifier
n.a unique name or label used to recognize a specific person or thing. In computing, it is the name you give to a variable or a piece of data.
n.a sequence of characters used to uniquely distinguish an entity within a specific system or context. In programming, it refers to the user-defined name of a variable, function, or class.
“Each user has a unique identifier in the database.”
“The compiler threw an error because the identifier started with a number, which violates the language's naming rules.”
“To maintain data integrity across the distributed system, the architecture assigns a globally unique identifier to every transaction, ensuring no two records can ever be confused during synchronization.”
Commonly used in technical contexts; often abbreviated as 'ID' in informal speech or documentation.
“It depended on stable identifiers, which are labels or numbers that point to the same organization or event across different records.”
“Zuckoff uses these identifiers to help users detect specific smart-glasses models while ignoring Bluetooth signals from less creepy devices.”
From identify + -er.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.