How to display welcome ad displayname message

[Sameer1]

HI all,
I am trying to display user (ad displayname) welcome message on my web site but I am not sure how to achieve it. I found somthing online but that doesn't make any sence to me as I dont have nay value of $user_ID in the below code,

< ?php global $user_ID; if( $user_ID ) : ?>
< ?php if( current_user_can('level_0') ) : ?>

Welcome back < ?php global $current_user; get_currentuserinfo(); echo ($current_user->user_login); ?>. In case youve missed anything, heres what weve recently posted.

<ul>< ?php wp_get_archives('type=postbypost&limit=5'); ?></ul>
< ?php else : ?>
< ?php endif; ?>
< ?php endif; ?>

Problem is that I dont want to take any input from the user otherwise its pretty easy to do it. I am sure there would be some as there many websites that does it for you. We have an internal web site that does it. I just dont know how to..:)
It will be great if some one could help me out with it.

Regards,
SM.

[FlashCreations]

To display the username and display name all you need to do is use get_currentuserinfo() :

<?php
//Declare a global to hold the user's username and display name
global $user_login, $display_name;

//Get the user's information
get_currentuserinfo();

//Then display a welcome message
echo "<strong>Welcome back {$display_name} ({$user_login})!</strong>"
?>

Use the current_user_can('level_x'); function to determine the rank of the user. Here's the different level codes:

Administrator - Level 10 (level_10)
Editor - Level 7 (level_7)
Author - Level 4 (level_4)
Contributor - Level 2 (level_2)
Subscriber - Level 0 (level_0)

Knowing this you can show certain text to authors or above only:

<?php if(current_user_can("level_4")): ?>
   <b>Hey Authors, Editors, and Admins!</b>
<?php endif; ?>

[SameerMughal]

Hi,
I did tried your code but I get the Fetal error: call to undefined function get_currentuserinfo();
Do you know what plugin or class I would have to install or any changes that I need to make to php.ini to get it working. I am using php 5.1.6

[ayesha789]

Use session to get username and echo

[SameerMughal]

Thanks ayesha I wish it would be that easy for me. :)
Problem that I am dealing is little complex. What I am expecting is that get_currentuserinfo() would get me the ad display name and from there I can map to the cname of the user and verify against the ad group that belongs.
Actually its a sub step of the actual problem that I am dealing with. Here is what I am actually trying to do,
In case I take the username/pass and bind against ad using ldap, we have got to different windows accounts.One is structured like [e-mail] other is regional account lets say uk account, we can login to windows with both of them with same password but I cant bind the LDAP connection using uk account. The common name (cn) in active directory is based on uk account name.

What I have asked above would get me the cname or display name of the user and then I verify the user group from there.

[FlashCreations]

Are you using wordpress?

[SameerMughal]

Ya because I found that this function needs pluggable.php class for which i had to install wordpress. But its a joke you create a db in there to make it work which I could have done myself.

Wordpress is not a solution I am looking for coz you have to add user records to db which I didnt wanted at the first place.
I am using LDAP to communicate to AD

Now the question is was I not suppose to use wordpress?
I get undefined function, fetal error otherwise
Please let me know if it would work otherwise (without wordpress) and how to make it work.

[FlashCreations]

You cannot install wordpress just for a function. The functions that come with wordpress are meant to be used within wordpress. Why not create your own user system. It's must easier than trying to piece-meal one together from pre-written scripts.

[SameerMughal]

I know what you are saying but ur comments are not helping mate. Misguided me first, I wasted whole day working on wordpress as I had never used it before. Ofcourse I can make my own user system much quicker but I dont want to go that way.

Do you know anything about ldap?
If yes then my question is that I am using the below code to intract with ad and I can retrieve the attributes like displayname, cn, sn but for some reason I cant get values for 'userPrincipalName, distinguishedName, sAMAccountNAme' etc..
Please let me know if you can think of any reason. Here is the code,

<?php 
    $username =  $_POST['username']; 
    $password =  $_POST['password']; 
    $dn = "ou=Users,ou=Accounts,OU=GB,dc=eur,dc=msd,dc=world,dc=company 
    $ad = ldap_connect("ldap://ldap_server") 
          or die("Couldn't connect to AD!"); 
        $attribute = array("userPrincipalName" , "cn","sAMAccountName", "distinguishedName"); 

    ldap_set_option($ad, LDAP_OPT_PROTOCOL_VERSION, 3); 
    ldap_set_option($ad, LDAP_OPT_REFERRALS, 0) 
or die ("Could not set option referrals"); 
$bd = ldap_bind($ad,$username,$password) 
          or die("Couldn't bind to AD!"); 
$entries = ""; 
$filter_array = array('(cn=user1)', '(cn=user2)');   
for($j= 0; $j<count($filter_array); $j++)  
 { 
    $result = ldap_search($ad, $dn,$filter_array[$j], $attribute); 

    $entries = ldap_get_entries($ad, $result); 
for ($i=0; $i<$entries["count"]; $i++) 
    { echo $entries[$i]["displayname"] // can change the attributes here to display 
             [0]."(".$entries[$i]["l"][0].")<br />"; 
    }   
} 
ldap_unbind($ad); 
?>

[BzzBee]

Does the user information store in your database any where?

[SameerMughal]

I wish that would be the case. Problem is we dont want to do it that way for few reasons...

[BzzBee]

you are even not taking username from users? right? whats in your mind, how you can display username if you dont have it any where?

[SameerMughal]

I wish that would be the case. Problem is that we dont to go that way, otherwise I would have done it ages ago.
Can you think any other way.

[SameerMughal]

sorry I couldn't see ur last message.
Now I am taking the windows credentials coz I couldn't found any solution.
what I am trying to do is simple. When user login with the windows credentials, I make a bind to ad using LDAP and retrieve userinformation from there I can do whatever I like.
Problemis that I can search attributes like displayname, cn etc but for some reason I cant get to see the one I am willing to like userPrincipalName...
Thing is that userPrincipalName is same as your login name and if I will be able to find that then I can authenticate user against their groups based on userPrincipalName filter.
hope you understand what I am trying to say

[BzzBee]

I think you want a new programming trick in which we can know the person name without even knowing his/her name. wowww... Isn't it magic??????? You even dont want to let user tell his/her name in any way but your want to shock him by showing his/her name. Good haan.... Keep it upppp

[BzzBee]

best of luck....

[SameerMughal]

not realy please see the post just above

[SameerMughal]

Here is how you do it.... took me time but ya it is possible bzzBee, just have to think a bit to aim to be able to achieve, no magic trust me :)

There are two magic php variables which would get you username of the person logged into windows.
$_SERVER , $_SERVER

Pick them up from client side, create a dummy/web account in ad, use windows authentication for that account, use the cn (common name) or userpricipalname attribute , check the user group membership and thats it job done.