Submit a Pull Request Report a Bug
    ＋add a note

    User Contributed Notes 34 notes

    up
    14
    nick dot veitch at futurenet dot co dot
    20 years ago
    It might be useful to list here the operators that work:

    =         - matches exact value
    =*xxx  - matches values ending xxx
    =xxx*  - matches values beginning xxx
    =*xxx* - matches values containing xxx
    =*       - matches all values (if set - NULLS are not returned)

    >=xxx  - matches everthing from xxx to end of directory
    <=xxx  - matches everything up to xxx in directory

    ~=xxx      - matches similar entries (not all systems)

    Boolean operators for constructing complex search

    &(term1)(term2)  - matches term1 AND term2
    | (term1)(term2)  - matches term1 OR term2
    !(term1)                 - matches NOT term1
    &(|(term1)(term2))(!(&(term1)(term2)) - matches XOR term1 term2

    some of the more compelx constructions seem to work with varying  degrees of efficiency - sometimes it can be better to filter some of the results with the search and do further filtering in PHP.
    up
    16
    jayleno at yahoo dot com
    9 years ago
    <?php
    set_time_limit    (30);
    error_reporting(E_ALL);
    ini_set('error_reporting', E_ALL);
    ini_set('display_errors',1);

    // config
    $ldapserver = 'svr.domain.com';
    $ldapuser      = 'administrator'; 
    $ldappass     = 'PASSWORD_HERE';
    $ldaptree    = "OU=SBSUsers,OU=Users,OU=MyBusiness,DC=myDomain,DC=local";

    // connect
    $ldapconn = ldap_connect($ldapserver) or die("Could not connect to LDAP server.");

    if(    $ldapconn) {
            // binding to ldap server
            $ldapbind = ldap_bind($ldapconn, $ldapuser, $ldappass) or die ("Error trying to bind: ".ldap_error($ldapconn));
            // verify binding
            if ($ldapbind) {
            echo     "LDAP bind successful...<br /><br />";
           
           
                $result = ldap_search($ldapconn,$ldaptree, "(cn=*)") or die ("Error in search query: ".ldap_error($ldapconn));
                $data = ldap_get_entries($ldapconn, $result);
           
                // SHOW ALL DATA
                echo '<h1>Dump all data</h1><pre>';
                print_r($data);   
            echo     '</pre>';
           
           
                // iterate over array and print data for each entry
                echo '<h1>Show me the users</h1>';
            for (    $i=0; $i<$data["count"]; $i++) {
                    //echo "dn is: ". $data[$i]["dn"] ."<br />";
                    echo "User: ". $data[$i]["cn"][0] ."<br />";
                if(isset(    $data[$i]["mail"][0])) {
                    echo     "Email: ". $data[$i]["mail"][0] ."<br /><br />";
                } else {
                    echo     "Email: None<br /><br />";
                }
            }
                // print number of entries found
                echo "Number of entries found: " . ldap_count_entries($ldapconn, $result);
        } else {
            echo     "LDAP bind failed...";
        }

    }

    // all done? clean up
    ldap_close($ldapconn);
    ?>
    up
    11
    chrisbloom7 at gmail dot com
    15 years ago
    Here are a couple of resources for proper construction of filters.

    http://msdn2.microsoft.com/En-US/library/aa746475.aspx

    http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa996205.aspx

    Before finding these I had been stumped for hours on how to do something like "all users starting with "a" except those from OU 'foo'"
    up
    6
    aa529 at nospamchebucto dot ns dot ca
    23 years ago
    Be careful of special characters when generating filters from user input.

    *, (, ), \ and NUL should be backslash-escaped. See section 4 of RFC 2254 (I found it here:
    http://www.cis.ohio-state.edu/htbin/rfc/rfc2254.html)
    up
    2
    steven_bauman at outlook dot com
    3 years ago
    Can an example using the new $serverctrls parameter please be added? I have no idea how to use this.
    up
    4
    john_taylor_1973 at yahoo dot com
    20 years ago
    Try to use ldap_list(), if possible.  It is much faster.  ldap_search searches a scope of LDAP_SCOPE_SUBTREE, but ldap_list searches a scope of just LDAP_SCOPE_ONELEVEL.  This made a big difference on Novell eDirectory 8.6.1, even for a query that only returned 130 objects.  Using an attribute list, the 4th function parameter (of either function), also made queries faster.
    up
    4
    Arnold
    11 years ago
    I have been working on a script where I needed to get all the users who were member of a specific MS AD group. Because of PHP bug #42060 ( http://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=42060 ) I could not get all the users back who were member of the group.
    After googling for a day I found an article and a patch but it required that I downloaded the source code for php 5.1.6 or 5.2.10 run the patch and than recompile the code to fix the problem.
    Problem was
    1) I am not a Linux goeroe so I was not very comfortable doing this....
    2) I am running the script on a production machine with other code using PHP and did not know what the consequence would bee for that code.
    3) I could not update PHP anymore because in newer versions this patch would probably not work any more.

    But yesterday I saw the light and wrote some code to get around this problem, maybe other people can use it that have the same problem.

    <?PHP
    $startFilter            = "(&(memberOf=" .$ADGroup. "))";
    $startResults        = ldap_search($ldapconnect, $userBase, $startFilter, $attr);
    $countResult        = ldap_count_entries($ldapconnect,$startResults);

    IF(    $countResult == 1000 OR $countResult == 1500)
    {
            // loop trough the number 97-122 (ASCII number for the characters a-z)
            For($a=97;$a<=122;$a++)
        {
                // translate the number to a character
                $character            = chr($a);
                // the new search filter withs returns all users with a last name starting with $character
                $filter            = "(&(sn=$character*)(memberOf=$ADGroup))";
                $results        = ldap_search($ldapconnect, $userBase, $filter, $attr);
                $countResult2    = ldap_count_entries($ldapconnect,$results);
               
                // See if the search for all users starting with a specific character still hits the search limit
            // if so than do a new search to find all the users where the last name starts with "aa" and
            // than with "ab", "ac" etc. etc
            // In the best case we can now find 675.324 users per group when the search limit is 1000
            // ((26 * 999  for the fist character) * 26 for the second character)
            // and 1.013.324 when the search limit is 1500
                If($countResult2 == 1000 or $countResult2 == 1500)
            {
                For(    $b=97;$b<=122;$b++)
                {
                        $character2    = chr($b);
                        $filter2    = "(&(sn=$character$character2*)(memberOf=$ADGroup))";
                        $results2    = ldap_search($ldapconnect, $userBase, $filter2, $attr);
                        $count2        = ldap_count_entries($ldapconnect,$results2);   
                        $entries2    = ldap_get_entries($ldapconnect,$results2);                       
                   
                        // do your thing
                    }
            }
            Else
            {
                    $entries            = ldap_get_entries($ldapconnect,$results);
                    // do your thing
                }
        }
    }
    else
    {
            $entries            = ldap_get_entries($ldapconnect,$startResults);
            // do your thing
    }
    ?>
    up
    3
    cruzfern at chuchuwa dot com dot ar
    17 years ago
    The internal attributes (like createTimestamp, modifyTimestamp, etc), don't come by default (when the optional parameter attributes is not set). You have to specify it:

    <?
    $r=ldap_search($ds,$base,$filter,array("createTimestamp"));
    ?>
    up
    3
    francis dot tyers at hp dot com
    19 years ago
    it seems that all fields must be used in lower case even if they are mixed case in the ldapsearch output.

    example:

    gidNumber: 1010
    homeDirectory: /home/dnt

    must be:

    echo "gid: " . $info[$i]["gidnumber"][0] . "<br>";
    echo "home directory: ". $info[$i]["homedirectory"][0] ."<br>";

    not ( $info[$i]["homeDirectory"][0] ) etc.
    up
    1
    cdaveb at csua dot berkeley dot edu
    22 years ago
    FYI, for those doing LDAP searches on Exchange servers, there seems to be some preference in Exchange to disallow searches that aren't initial searches (i.e. only x* will work, not * or *x). I'd been going nuts trying to figure out why I kept getting errors doing * searches.

    More info at:
    http://www.microsoft.com/Exchange/en/55/help/documents/server/XOG16007.HTM
    up
    4
    Jean-Loup
    11 years ago
    Example of parallel search :

    <?php
    $basedn    =array('dmdName=users,dc=foo,dc=fr','dmdName=users,dc=bar,dc=com');  // two basedn
    $filter='(&(objectClass=inetOrgPerson)(uid=*))';  // single filter
    $attributes=array('dn','uid','sn');

    $cnx = ldap_connect('localhost',389); // single connection
    ldap_set_option($cnx, LDAP_OPT_PROTOCOL_VERSION, 3);

    ldap_bind($cnx,'uid=root,dc=foo,dc=fr','password');  // authentication on two BDB
    ldap_bind($cnx,'uid=root,dc=bar,dc=com','password');

    $search = ldap_search(array($cnx,$cnx),$basedn,$filter,$attributes);  // search

    // result
    for($i=0;$i<count($search);$i++){
            print_r(ldap_get_entries($cnx,$search[$i]));
        print     "\n";
    }
    ?>
    up
    2
    sembiance at cosmicrealms dot com
    19 years ago
    When searching for BINARY data (such as an Active Directory objectGUID) you need to escape each hexadecimal character with a backslash.

    The following command line run of ldapsearch shows:
    ldapsearch -b "dc=blahblah,dc=com" "(objectGUID=\AE\C3\23\35\F7)"

    In PHP, you need to escape the escape for the backslash:
    ldap_search($ds,"dc=blahblah,dc=com", "(objectGUID=\\AE\\C3\\23\\35\\F7)");
    up
    2
    nicolas at atanis dot net
    19 years ago
    Here is a little script that make a complete subtree search ( i know a script above seems do that but it doesnt work fine)
    This is my version:

    Voila ce que j'ai fait aujourd'hui ...

          $ldap_host = "192.168.0.50";
        $ldap_port = "389";
        $base_dn = "dc=fr";
        $filter = "(cn=*)";
        $ldap_user ="cn=admin,dc=fr";
        $ldap_pass = "hellodelu";
        $connect = ldap_connect( $ldap_host, $ldap_port);
        ldap_set_option($connect, LDAP_OPT_PROTOCOL_VERSION, 3);

        $bind = ldap_bind($connect, $ldap_user, $ldap_pass);
        $read = ldap_search($connect, $base_dn, $filter);
       
        $info = ldap_get_entries($connect, $read);
        echo $info["count"]." entrees retournees<BR><BR>";
        for($ligne = 0; $ligne<$info["count"]; $ligne++)
        {
            for($colonne = 0; $colonne<$info[$ligne]["count"]; $colonne++)
            {
                $data = $info[$ligne][$colonne];
                echo $data.":".$info[$ligne][$data][0]."<BR>";
            }
            echo "<BR>";
        }
    ldap_close($connect);

    --------
    nicolas
    up
    3
    sema at technion dot ac dot il
    18 years ago
    In order to perform the searches on Windows 2003 Server Active Directory you have to set the LDAP_OPT_REFERRALS option to 0:

    ldap_set_option($ldap, LDAP_OPT_REFERRALS, 0);

    Without this, you will get "Operations error" if you try to search the whole AD schema (using root of the domain as a $base_dn).

    As opposed to Windows 2000 Server, where this option was optional and only increased the performance.
    up
    1
    jpdalbec at ysu dot edu
    20 years ago
    I've found that spaces need to be escaped in search filters ("\20"), at least using the Red Hat PHP 4.1.2 package.  Otherwise no results are returned.
    up
    1
    chester at the dot underground dot com dot au
    19 years ago
    If you are searching active directory and are experiencing lag or time outs, it may be that you are being given ldap referrals from the ldap server. The following code will disable this.

    <?
    ldap_set_option($connect, LDAP_OPT_REFERRALS, 0);
    ?>
    up
    2
    mike at remi-designs dot net
    6 years ago
    I ran into the problem, that the attribute I was search for had the matching rule of "exactMatch".

    Example:
    E-Mail Address is stored in mixed case: John.Doe@example.com

    LDAP Search will not retrieve any values when the user enters: john.doe@example.com

    Solution: instead of comparing user input and attribute value by

    <?php
    if($data[$i]['mail'][0] == $username) {
            // this will run into nothing
    }
    ?>

    use strcasecmp instead:

    <?php
    if(strcasecmp($data[$i]['mail'][0], $username) == 0) {
            // works
    }
    up
    1
    me at gavinadams dot org
    19 years ago
    Minor clarification on AD LDAP searchs. Small typo in previous example, and does not display multiple values per attribute. Here's the for loop to enumerate all entries, attributes, and values:

    $bind = ldap_bind($connect) // asume anon connect or add user/pass
         or exit(">>Could not bind to $ldap_host<<");
    $read = ldap_search($connect, $base_dn, $filter)
         or exit(">>Unable to search ldap server<<");
    $info = ldap_get_entries($connect, $read);
    echo $info["count"]." entries returned<br>";
    // $i = entries
    // $ii = attributes for entry
    // $iii = values per attribute
    for ($i = 0; $i<$info["count"]; $i++) {
      for ($ii=0; $ii<$info[$i]["count"]; $ii++){
         $data = $info[$i][$ii];
         for ($iii=0; $iii<$info[$i][$data]["count"]; $iii++) {
           echo $data.":&nbsp;&nbsp;".$info[$i][$data][$iii]."<br>";
         }
      }
    echo "<p>"; // separate entries
    up
    1
    peter dot mlich at volny dot cz
    2 years ago
    Example code from my ldap class.

    public function query($_filter, $_att, $_ref=2, $count_bool=true)
        {
        $fn     = 'query';
        $config = $this->config;
        $conn   = $this->conn;
        if (!$conn)
            {return $this->errorConnection($fn);}
        ldap_set_option($conn, LDAP_OPT_DEREF, $_ref);   
        $result = ldap_search($conn, $config['baseDn'], $_filter, $_att);    //  or die(ldap_error($conn))
        if ($result===false)
            {
            $this->error("Search error, neexistuje!");
            return false;
            }
        $count = ldap_count_entries($conn, $result);
        if ($count_bool && $count!=1)
            {
            $this->error("Search error, neni unikatni! count=".$count);
            ldap_free_result($result);
            return false;
            }
        $data = ldap_get_entries($conn, $result);
        ldap_free_result($result);
        return $data;
        }

    // ---

        $filter = "(&(objectclass=person)(cn=" . $user_name . "))";
        $att    = array(
            'uid',
            'workforceID',
            'employeeID',
            'givenName',
            'sn',
            'mail'
            );
        $data   = $this->query($filter, $att, 2, true);
    up
    0
    anze dot pratnemer at fe dot uni-lj dot si
    4 years ago
    While developing a plugin, I had to search users on LDAP server using ldap_search() command and it was not finding them, but ldapsearch command in unix shell (ubuntu) did.

    Problem was few lines above in my code, around ldap_connect(). For server address I input ldap://server.hostname, which turned to be the culprit.

    Once I used only server.hostname, without protocol (ldap://), users where found and shown correctly.
    up
    0
    Allie
    16 years ago
    I just posted on the ldap_bind, but I figured it couldn't hurt here since this was the first place I stopped when trying to figure out my problem.  My error pointed to ldap_search, but specifying the ldap_connect port was the fix.

    When you want to search the entire directory for MS AD, you must specify port 3268 in your bind.  This is also true for apache auth_ldap.

    $ldapserver = ldap_connect($server,3268);
    up
    0
    Anonymous
    21 years ago
    I used the following to retrieve all entries from an ILS (Netmeeting) Server:<p>    $sr=ldap_search($ds, "objectclass=rtperson","(&(cn=%)(objectclass=rtperson))");
    <p>Have fun!
    <p>Kees
    up
    -1
    php @ fccfurn dot com
    19 years ago
    To do subtree search from top DN in Active Directory, Make sure you do your ldap_set_option().

    <?php
    $ldap_host     = "pdc.php.net";
    $base_dn = "DC=php,DC=net";
    $filter = "(cn=Joe User)";
    $ldap_user  = "CN=Joe User,OU=Sales,DC=php,DC=net";
    $ldap_pass = "pass";
    $connect = ldap_connect( $ldap_host, $ldap_port)
             or exit(    ">>Could not connect to LDAP server<<");
    ldap_set_option($connect, LDAP_OPT_PROTOCOL_VERSION, 3);
    ldap_set_option($connect, LDAP_OPT_REFERRALS, 0);
    $bind = ldap_bind($connect, $ldap_user, $ldap_pass)
          or exit(    ">>Could not bind to $ldap_host<<");
    $read = ldap_search($connect, $base_dn, $filter)
          or exit(    ">>Unable to search ldap server<<");
    $info = ldap_get_entries($connect, $read);
    echo     $info["count"]." entries returned<p>";
    $ii=0;
    for (    $i=0; $ii<$info[$i]["count"]; $ii++){
            $data = $info[$i][$ii];
        echo     $data.":&nbsp;&nbsp;".$info[$i][$data][0]."<br>";
    }
    ldap_close($connect);
    ?>
    up
    -1
    ben _at_ onshop_co_uk
    13 years ago
    Example to illustrate searching more than one DN (multiple DNs):

    <?php
    $ds    =ldap_connect($ldapserver);

    $dn[]='OU=ABC,DC=xyz,DC=ac,DC=uk';
    $dn[]='OU=DEF,DC=xyz,DC=ac,DC=uk';

    $id[] = $ds;
    $id[] = $ds;

    $filter = 'samaccountname='.$_POST['username'];

    $result = ldap_search($id,$dn,$filter);

    $search = false;

    foreach (    $result as $value) {
        if(    ldap_count_entries($ds,$value)>0){
                $search = $value;
            break;
        }
    }

    if(    $search){
            $info = ldap_get_entries($ds, $search);
    }else{
            $info = 'No results found';
    }
    ?>
    up
    -1
    ben _at_ onshop.co.uk
    13 years ago
    Following from my note of 11-Nov-2009 06:56 regarding DN issues when using LDAP instead of the Global Catalog when querying AD, further investigation was showing that although the results were in the packet, I was getting an error instead:

    'Search: Can't contact LDAP server' AKA Error 81.

    Using more detailed analysis:

    ldap_get_option($ds,LDAP_OPT_ERROR_STRING,$error);

    echo $error

    Displayed:

    Referral: ldap://DomainDnsZones.defg.de.bc.ac.uk/ DC=DomainDnsZonesDC=defg,DC=de,DC=abc,DC=ac,DC=uk

    By using trial and error, the error went away and results returned when using:

    ldap_set_option($ds, LDAP_OPT_PROTOCOL_VERSION, 3);
    up
    -1
    Kamil Kukura <kamk at nexen dot cz>
    20 years ago
    When I tried to search with empty base DN on OpenLDAP server which had "" namingContext I got result "no such object". In the log file there was query for dn: dc=example,dc=com (!).
    As a workaround, it seems it's enough to feed it with space (' ') as base DN - ldap_search($ds, ' ', '(...filter...)', ...
    up
    -3
    info at acpower dot biz
    11 years ago
    I'm a newbie, so I hope this helps some other newbie with a head scratcher...

    This code returned an error of 'No Such Object':

    <?php

        $search     = ldap_search ($ldapcon, "cn=admin,dc=acpower,dc=biz", "(filters)");

    ?>

    I took out the cn, and magic! it works:

    <?php

        $search     = ldap_search ($ldapcon, "dc=acpower,dc=biz", "(filters)");

    ?>
    up
    -2
    openldap at mail dot doris dot cc
    18 years ago
    PHP 4.3.10

    I was trying to do an ldapsearch without a basedn.  First, I tried with ' ', as suggested above, but it gave me invalid dn syntax error.

    ie:
    $sr=ldap_search($ds, ' ', $filter);
    Warning: ldap_search(): Search: Invalid DN syntax in ...

    Then I changed it to
    $sr=ldap_search($ds, "", $filter);

    Which gave me the following error:
    Warning: ldap_search(): Search: No such object in ...

    With that I then modified my ldap.conf file and commented out the BASE field
    #BASE   dc=example, dc=com

    Then it worked!

    So it looks like if you supply a blank basedn, then it will use your default basedn in ldap.conf.
    up
    -1
    emrecio at netscape dot net
    20 years ago
    implode(", ",$uentry[0]["rfc822mailalias"]);

    doesn't work as expected because "count" is in there... one /must/ use the 'for' loop to cycle through results (discarding "count" element).
    up
    -2
    fmouse at fmp dot com
    18 years ago
    It appears that the Netscape Directory SDK (developer.netscape.com) referenced for LDAP filter information is no longer accepting connections.   The A copy of RFC 2254 which defines the standard for string representations of LDAP filters can be found  at http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2254.txt
    up
    -2
    neumeyed at city dot bloomington dot in dot us
    20 years ago
    A previous comment noted: "I've also noticed that the departmentNumber, employeeNumber (and maybe others in inetorgperson.schema) are not returned from a search."

    This is incorrect. These attributes are returned, but you must reference them with lowercase names. That is, instead of doing this:

    $entries[0]["departmentNumber"][0]

    Do this:

    $entries[0]["departmentnumber"][0]

    This doesn't seem like "correct" behavior to me, but I don't know enough about LDAP to say for sure.
    up
    -4
    nick
    11 years ago
    Results from ActiveDirectory may be ordered by objectSid.
    We can get all users for each page size by modify filter.

    <?php
    // ... connect to ldap
    $lastsid='';
    while (    1) {
            $filter = '(objectClass=user)';
        if (    strlen($lastsid)) {
            list(    $v)=array_values(unpack('V',substr($lastsid,24))); // id for user.
                $s = substr($lastsid,0,24).pack('V',1+$v); // next sid.
                $s = preg_replace('/../','\\\\$0',bin2hex($s)); // escape for fiter
                $filter = '(&'.$filter.'(objectSid>='.$s.'))'; // fiter for next entries.
            }
            $res = ldap_search($ldap,$basedn,$filter,array('objectSid','cn'));
        if (!    ldap_count_entries($ldap,$res)) {
            break;
        }
        for (    $ent=ldap_first_entry($ldap,$res); $ent; $ent=ldap_next_entry($ldap,$ent)) {
            list(    $lastsid) = ldap_get_values_len($ldap,$ent,'objectSid');
        }
    }
    ?>
    up
    -9
    Anonymous
    17 years ago
    HOWTO list LDAP users.

    This CODE list one user from LDAP tree, but I' like list all user from LDAP one ou=Organization

    <?php

    $ldaprdn     = 'cn=user,dc=domain,dc=org';
    $ldappass = 'password';
    $sdn = 'cn=user,ou=group,dc=domain,dc=org';

    $ldapconn = ldap_connect("ldap://localhost", 389)
    or die(    "Not connect: $ldaphost ");

    if (    $ldapconn) {

    // binding to ldap server
    $ldapbind = ldap_bind($ldapconn, $ldaprdn, $ldappass);

    // verify binding
    if ($ldapbind) {
    $filter="uid=*";
    $justthese = array("uid");

    $sr=ldap_read($ldapconn, $srdn, $filter, $justthese);
    $entry = ldap_get_entries($ldapconn, $sr);

    } else {
    echo     "LDAP conn ok...";
    }

    }

    ldap_close($ldapconn);

    ?>
    <?php
    echo $entry[0]["mail"][0] . " mail adress ";
    echo     $entry[0]["sn"][0] . " Name ";
    ?>
    up
    -7
    rsu_friend at yahoo dot com
    18 years ago
    I was doing a ldap_search with
    $searchbasedn = "miDomainName=" . $_SESSION['selectDomain'] ."," . LDAP_DOMAINBASE;
    $filter = "(&(mpsAccountNumber=". $acctNumber .")(objectclass=mpsAccountDetails))";   
    $attributes = array("mpsparentchild");

    $sr = ldap_search($ldapconn, $searchbasedn, $filter,$attributes); 

    For some reasone this search was failing
    but I was able to do successful search only when I gave the search filter as
    $filter = "(&(mpsAccountNumber= $acctNumber )(objectclass=mpsAccountDetails))";   

    I did not get why the ldap_search was not able to search in the first case.
    ＋add a note
    To Top