@genietim & @Sarah Lane are both whiz kids, any ideas on this request? 

If you follow the description in https://help.pipefy.com/en/articles/875875-inventory-control, you will already have an employee database, right? You can simply add a connection field in the equipment database (to the employee database) to select a user per equipment.

 @genietim thanks for you answer, I already did what you suggested, however, if I create such a database field connection, I basically have to administrate the equipment-user association at database level not at the inventory pipe level. The pipe process as described in the article does the same connection at pipe level (without univocity) not at database level. My goal is to univocally administrate the employee-equipment association at the inventory control pipe level while having independent and not connected employee and equipment databases, which can be used for others purposes. 

@pedro-barrios I see. The only possibility (yet, as far as I know) to require fields to have unique values, is for certain database fields.

Principally, I can imagine you to add a third, relational database then: a EquipmentToUser database. This database would include (min.) three fields:

• - The user (Employee-Connection)
• - The equipment (Equipment-Connection)
• - The equipment-ID (numeric field, which you require to be unique)

Now, in the Inventory pipe, I suppose you have some phase where you have the fields:

• - The user (Employee-Connection)
• - The equipment (Equipment-Connection)

All you need to do now is to add a third field: the EquipmentToUser database connection field. Make it required. One entry only. Create only. Add the autofill-options to set all the three values of this database to the values of the card you have to set the field in. Thanks to the required field, the database entry has to be created for the crad to progress. Thanks to the database requiring equipment to be unique, the database entry cannot be created if the equipment is already assigned somewhom. Therefore, the card can only progress when the equipment is not assigned yet.

Hello 

One way to manage the availability of equipment and users, is to place the equipment in one PIPE and the equipment requests in another PIPE that will be connected to the first.

Every time someone requests a equipment, an automation moves the equipment from an AVAILABLE phase to an UNAVAILABLE phase (Final Process Phase).

This procedure will prevent the equipment from being ordered more than once.

When the person returns the equipment in the first PIPE, the automation must remove the equipment from the final stage and return it to the initial stage of the process in the second PIPE.

This automation can be configured through Integromat. If you have any questions regarding this configuration, you can call me, I am a partner of Integromat and Pipefy

@Lucas Democh this solution does not solve “(...) equipment databases, which can be used for others purposes (...)”, except if your equipment pipe is simply a wrapper for the equipment database. But then, there is an issue again that multiple cards could be connected to the same equipment (no uniqueness), right.

The solution I list above has the (as I see it) only problem that it requires the creation of an entry in the auxilary relational table, which too could be solved using Integromat (auto-creation & connection).

What are the chances of Pipefy just buying Integromat and offering its features natively?

Without knowing anything about the business plans or financial situation of any of these two companies, I would consider these chances very minor. I could imagine Pipefy enhancing its “Automations” features to become a better competitor though.

Pipefy is as close as any platform I have seen to being a one-stop shop for process management. But like you said, there are still quite a few gaps in their features that will need to be filled in. Automations seem to be a pain point for certain users.