Smith normal form invariants
The Smith normal form diagonal entries are canonical invariants and control the cokernel module.
Smith normal form invariants: Let be a PID and let . Suppose has Smith normal form with . Then the elements are uniquely determined by up to multiplication by a unit of , and they determine the isomorphism class of the cokernel module
The uniqueness part comes from the Smith normal form theorem, and the decomposition agrees with the invariant factors in the structure theorem over a PID, computing cokernels over a PID.