Attention

TYPO3 v9 has reached its end-of-life September 30th, 2021 and is not maintained by the community anymore. Looking for a stable version? Use the version switch on the top left.

You can order Extended Long Term Support (ELTS) here: TYPO3 ELTS.

Backend User Object

The backend user of a session is always available in extensions as the global variable $GLOBALS['BE_USER']. The object is created in \TYPO3\CMS\Core\Core\Bootstrap::initializeBackendUser() and is an instance of the class \TYPO3\CMS\Core\Authentication\BackendUserAuthentication (which extends \TYPO3\CMS\Core\Authentication\AbstractUserAuthentication).

Checking User Access

The $BE_USER object is mostly used to check user access right, but contains other helpful information. This is presented here by a few examples:

Checking Access to Current Backend Module

$MCONF is module configuration and the key $MCONF['access'] determines the access scope for the module. This function call will check if the $BE_USER is allowed to access the module. If not allowed, the function will throw an exception, if the second parameter $exitOnError is true.

Note

The behaviour has changed in TYPO3 9: The second parameter $exitOnError is now deprecated and will trigger a deprecation notice. In TYPO3 10 it will be removed entirely.

$BE_USER->modAccess($MCONF);

Checking Access to any Backend Module

If you know the module key you can check if the module is included in the access list by this function call:

$BE_USER->check('modules', 'web_list');

Here access to the module WEB > List is checked.

Access to Tables and Fields?

The same function ->check() can actually check all the ->groupLists inside $BE_USER. For instance:

Checking modify access to the table "pages":

$BE_USER->check('tables_modify', 'pages');

Checking read access to the table "tt_content":

$BE_USER->check('tables_select', 'tt_content');

Checking if a table/field pair is allowed explicitly through the "Allowed Excludefields":

$BE_USER->check('non_exclude_fields', $table . ':' . $field);

Is "admin"?

If you want to know if a user is an "admin" user (has complete access), just call this method:

$BE_USER->isAdmin();

Read Access to a Page?

This function call will return true if the user has read access to a page (represented by its database record, $pageRec):

$BE_USER->doesUserHaveAccess($pageRec, 1);

Changing the "1" for other values will check other permissions:

  • use "2" for checking if the user may edit the page

  • use "4" for checking if the user may delete the page.

Is a Page Inside a DB Mount?

Access to a page should not be checked only based on page permissions but also if a page is found within a DB mount for ther user. This can be checked by this function call ($id is the page uid):

$BE_USER->isInWebMount($id)

Selecting Readable Pages From Database?

If you wish to make a SQL statement which selects pages from the database and you want it to be only pages that the user has read access to, you can have a proper WHERE clause returned by this function call:

$BE_USER->getPagePermsClause(1);

Again the number "1" represents the "read" permission; "2" is "edit" and "4" is "delete" permission. The result from the above query could be this string:

((pages.perms_everybody & 1 = 1)OR(pages.perms_userid = 2 AND pages.perms_user & 1 = 1)OR(pages.perms_groupid in (1) AND pages.perms_group & 1 = 1))

Saving Module Data

This stores the input variable $compareFlags (an array!) with the key "tools_beuser/index.php/compare"

$compareFlags = \TYPO3\CMS\Core\Utility\GeneralUtility::_GP('compareFlags');
$BE_USER->pushModuleData('tools_beuser/index.php/compare', $compareFlags);

Getting Module Data

This gets the module data with the key "tools_beuser/index.php/compare" (lasting only for the session)

$compareFlags = $BE_USER->getModuleData('tools_beuser/index.php/compare', 'ses');

Getting TSconfig

This function can return a value from the "User TSconfig" structure of the user. In this case the value for "options.clipboardNumberPads":

$tsconfig = $GLOBALS['BE_USER']->getTSConfig();
$clipboardNumberPads = $tsconfig['options.']['clipboardNumberPads'] ?? '';

Getting the Username

The full "be_users" record of a authenticated user is available in $BE_USER->user as an array. This will return the "username":

$BE_USER->user['username']

Get User Configuration Value

The internal ->uc array contains options which are managed by the User Tools > User Settings module (extension "setup"). These values are accessible in the $BE_USER->uc array. This will return the current state of "Notify me by email, when somebody logs in from my account" for the user:

$BE_USER->uc['emailMeAtLogin']