not able to display the real name of the users

Question

First of all, I am not a techie and have picked the codes mentioned below from various sources. I have added two new fields to the user profile - 'firstname' and 'surname'. I am using a custom theme and on one of the places (on a node), I need to display the real name (making some code changes) instead of the username.

I am replacing the existing code -

<h3><?php print $node->name ?></h3>

With this -

<h3><?php 
     $profile = user_load($node->uid); 
     $profile = user_view($profile); 
     $firstname = render($profile['field_firstname']); 
     $surname = render($profile['field_surname']); 
     print $firstname.' '.$surname; ?></h3>

However, a strange thing is happening. I am able to print the surname correctly but the firstname is blank every time, even when I tried to print only the firstname (or the surname). Why is it that the firstname is not getting picked? What changes should I make?

Answer 1

You can load the node object from the nid and from the node you can get user object.

With user object we can able to get firstname and lastname field values, if there is one. usually a node submitted by anonymous user will have no name.

you can try this code.This works in drupal7.

<?php 
    $node = node_load($nid);    
    $profile = user_load($node->uid);      
    $firstname = $profile->field_first_name['und'][0]['value'];
    $surname = $profile->field_last_name['und'][0]['value'];
    print $firstname.' '.$surname;
?> 

Answer 2

Did you try real name module before write your own code?

I did not use 6.x version, but i guess it will be more flexible than your solution.