Is there any way to get uid from user name in Drupal?

Question

Is there any core function to get uid from username in Drupal? Or I should perform a db query? my field is a textfield with '#autocomplete_path' equal to 'user/autocomplete'

Masakomasan

Answer 1

You can use the user_load function. See http://api.drupal.org/api/function/user_load/6

In particular see http://api.drupal.org/api/function/user_load/6#comment-6439

So you would do something like this:

// $name is the user name
$account = user_load(array('name' => check_plain($name)));
// uid is now available as $account->uid

Alina

To get the uid, this is quite a slow way to do it, as it involves all modules that implement hook_user creating an unknown amount of queries. – Leatherwood

@googletorp: Agree this is slow. But I thought it would be simpler for Hamid this way. Practically speaking node_load, which is similar in concept to user_load happens a lot in Drupal, if I'm not wrong, and yet doesn't adversely affect performance in most cases. So I thought it would be a good idea to recommend user_load – Alina

When he himself asks if he should just do a db query, I'm sure he will be able to do it. It's not that complicated after all. – Leatherwood

+1 - this would be the correct API function to use. Concerning performance, user_load() does not use static caching like node_load() does, so if that call is going to be made often during a page cycle, it might be better to do a custom query. – Whipstitch

I agree with Henrik. Don't do user_load() unless you're about to actually use more information than just the uid. It does not cache in D6. D7 on the other hand... – Usage

Answer 2

Somehow I couldn't make the query work but I found this:

$user = user_load_by_name($username);
$user_id = $user->uid;

see: http://api.drupal.org/api/drupal/modules%21user%21user.module/function/user_load_by_name/7

Kelbee

Your answeer is quite good because it's simple and it can be applied inside a custom validation function for login form (where user global var is no set yet) Thank you a lot! +1 – Putrescine

Answer 3

The user load function is very heavy, would use up more resources and return more data than required, Here is a nice little function for you:

function get_uid($username)
{    
    // Function that returns the uid based on the username given
    $user = db_fetch_object(db_query("SELECT uid FROM users WHERE name=':username'", array(":username" => $username)));

    return $user->uid;
}

Note: This code is revised and input is escaped, so the code is not dangerous in any way.

Hyperdulia

dont put email on stackoverflow in this format. You know you will be spamed – Rockingham

wow that is very dangerous query given its taking input from a form... google "injection attack" – Emalia

@EricBSchulz, yes it's dangerous but this is the best performing solution, especially in case there are lots of users to display. I tried to use the other methods but in my case user_load caused me to logout... so I am editing the answer to put check_plain around the username string. – Capacious

@Capacious there is no need for check_plain in this query, since arguments passed as I did above is escaped by drupal before the query is made – Hyperdulia

Answer 4

You can get all the info about logged user with global $user variable.

The code is:

<?php
global $user;
$uid = $user->uid;
echo $uid;
?>

Saleswoman

Your solution is the best but when you need to do this inside a custom validation function for login form you have to use Willem de Jong solution's. +1 – Putrescine

Answer 5

There is no ready made API function for this, not that I know of. But you can make your own if you needs several places. It should be pretty simple and straight forward to query the db for the uid.

Leatherwood