The Ldap Component

The Ldap Component

The Ldap Component

The Ldap component provides a means to connect to an LDAP server (OpenLDAP or Active Directory).

Installation

$ composer require symfony/ldap

Note

If you install this component outside of a Symfony application, you must require the vendor/autoload.php file in your code to enable the class autoloading mechanism provided by Composer. Read this article for more details.

Usage

The Symfony\Component\Ldap\Ldap class provides methods to authenticate and query against an LDAP server.

The Ldap class uses an Symfony\Component\Ldap\Adapter\AdapterInterface to communicate with an LDAP server. The adapter for PHP’s built-in LDAP extension, for example, can be configured using the following options:

host

IP or hostname of the LDAP server

port

Port used to access the LDAP server

version

The version of the LDAP protocol to use

encryption

The encryption protocol: ssl, tls or none (default)

connection_string

You may use this option instead of host and port to connect to the LDAP server

optReferrals

Specifies whether to automatically follow referrals returned by the LDAP server

options

LDAP server’s options as defined in ConnectionOptions

For example, to connect to a start-TLS secured LDAP server:

use Symfony\Component\Ldap\Ldap;
$ldap = Ldap::create('ext_ldap', [
    'host' => 'my-server',
    'encryption' => 'ssl',
]);

Or you could directly specify a connection string:

use Symfony\Component\Ldap\Ldap;
$ldap = Ldap::create('ext_ldap', ['connection_string' => 'ldaps://my-server:636']);

The bind() method authenticates a previously configured connection using both the distinguished name (DN) and the password of a user:

use Symfony\Component\Ldap\Ldap;
// ...
$ldap->bind($dn, $password);

Caution

When the LDAP server allows unauthenticated binds, a blank password will always be valid.

Once bound (or if you enabled anonymous authentication on your LDAP server), you may query the LDAP server using the query() method:

use Symfony\Component\Ldap\Ldap;
// ...
$query = $ldap->query('dc=symfony,dc=com', '(&(objectclass=person)(ou=Maintainers))');
$results = $query->execute();
foreach ($results as $entry) {
    // Do something with the results
}

By default, LDAP entries are lazy-loaded. If you wish to fetch all entries in a single call and do something with the results’ array, you may use the toArray() method:

use Symfony\Component\Ldap\Ldap;
// ...
$query = $ldap->query('dc=symfony,dc=com', '(&(objectclass=person)(ou=Maintainers))');
$results = $query->execute()->toArray();
// Do something with the results array

By default, LDAP queries use the Symfony\Component\Ldap\Adapter\QueryInterface::SCOPE_SUB scope, which corresponds to the LDAP_SCOPE_SUBTREE scope of the ldap_search function. You can also use SCOPE_BASE (related to the LDAP_SCOPE_BASE scope of ldap_read) and SCOPE_ONE (related to the LDAP_SCOPE_ONELEVEL scope of ldap_list):

use Symfony\Component\Ldap\Adapter\QueryInterface;
$query = $ldap->query('dc=symfony,dc=com', '...', ['scope' => QueryInterface::SCOPE_ONE]);

Use the filter option to only retrieve some specific attributes:

$query = $ldap->query(‘dc=symfony,dc=com’, ‘…’, [‘filter’ => [‘cn’, ‘mail’]);

Creating or Updating Entries

The Ldap component provides means to create new LDAP entries, update or even delete existing ones:

use Symfony\Component\Ldap\Entry;
use Symfony\Component\Ldap\Ldap;
// ...
$entry = new Entry('cn=Fabien Potencier,dc=symfony,dc=com', [
    'sn' => ['fabpot'],
    'objectClass' => ['inetOrgPerson'],
]);
$entryManager = $ldap->getEntryManager();
// Creating a new entry
$entryManager->add($entry);
// Finding and updating an existing entry
$query = $ldap->query('dc=symfony,dc=com', '(&(objectclass=person)(ou=Maintainers))');
$result = $query->execute();
$entry = $result[0];
$phoneNumber = $entry->getAttribute('phoneNumber');
$isContractor = $entry->hasAttribute('contractorCompany');
// attribute names in getAttribute() and hasAttribute() methods are case-sensitive
// pass FALSE as the second method argument to make them case-insensitive
$isContractor = $entry->hasAttribute('contractorCompany', false);
$entry->setAttribute('email', ['[email protected]']);
$entryManager->update($entry);
// Adding or removing values to a multi-valued attribute is more efficient than using update()
$entryManager->addAttributeValues($entry, 'telephoneNumber', ['+1.111.222.3333', '+1.222.333.4444']);
$entryManager->removeAttributeValues($entry, 'telephoneNumber', ['+1.111.222.3333', '+1.222.333.4444']);
// Removing an existing entry
$entryManager->remove(new Entry('cn=Test User,dc=symfony,dc=com'));

New in version 5.3: The option to make attribute names case-insensitive in getAttribute() andhasAttribute() was introduced in Symfony 5.3.

Batch Updating

Use the entry manager’s applyOperations() method to update multiple attributes at once:

use Symfony\Component\Ldap\Entry;
use Symfony\Component\Ldap\Ldap;
// ...
$entry = new Entry('cn=Fabien Potencier,dc=symfony,dc=com', [
    'sn' => ['fabpot'],
    'objectClass' => ['inetOrgPerson'],
]);
$entryManager = $ldap->getEntryManager();
// Adding multiple email addresses at once
$entryManager->applyOperations($entry->getDn(), [
    new UpdateOperation(LDAP_MODIFY_BATCH_ADD, 'mail', '[email protected]'),
    new UpdateOperation(LDAP_MODIFY_BATCH_ADD, 'mail', '[email protected]'),
]);

Possible operation types are LDAP_MODIFY_BATCH_ADD, LDAP_MODIFY_BATCH_REMOVE, LDAP_MODIFY_BATCH_REMOVE_ALL, LDAP_MODIFY_BATCH_REPLACE. Parameter $values must be NULL when using LDAP_MODIFY_BATCH_REMOVE_ALL operation type.

This work, including the code samples, is licensed under a Creative Commons BY-SA 3.0 license.