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Published Jul. 2, 2025

Unable to import User Groups from LDAP containing a comma "," or an asterisk "*"

Written By

Dávid Hegedüs

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Issue

  • Receiving the following error when trying to import User Groups from LDAP containing a comma "," or an asterisk "*":
2020-06-04 08:23:50.268 WARN [main][LDAPUserImporterImpl:1165] Unable to create user group test,users
2020-06-04 08:23:50.280 ERROR [main][LDAPUserImporterImpl:780] Unable to import group cn=test\,users,ou=groups: null:null:{cn=cn: test,users} java.lang.NullPointerException
 at com.liferay.portal.security.ldap.internal.exportimport.LDAPUserImporterImpl.getUsers(LDAPUserImporterImpl.java:720)
 at com.liferay.portal.security.ldap.internal.exportimport.LDAPUserImporterImpl.importFromLDAPByGroup(LDAPUserImporterImpl.java:763)
 at com.liferay.portal.security.ldap.internal.exportimport.LDAPUserImporterImpl.importUsers(LDAPUserImporterImpl.java:474)
 at com.liferay.portal.security.ldap.internal.exportimport.LDAPUserImporterImpl.importUsers(LDAPUserImporterImpl.java:415)
...

Environment

  • Liferay Portal 6.0+
  • Liferay DXP 7.0+
  • LDAP

Resolution

  • User Groups in Liferay can not contain "," and "*" in their names, therefore generates com.liferay.portal.kernel.exception.UserGroupNameException when trying to add the User Group based on the LDAP Group. The NullPointerException happens because later when #getUsers is invoked it receives "null" as User Group.
  • A possible workaround would be to:
    1. Create a custom @Component that implements com.liferay.portal.security.ldap.exportimport.LDAPToPortalConverter: in the importLDAPGroup method
    2. Implement a custom logic that accounts the special characters in a way that is suitable (for example remove the comma)
    3. So when ldapGroup.getGroupName() will be used later as the name for the User Group to be created in
      LDAPUserImporterImpl.importUserGroup(long, Attributes, Properties) it won't fail and the User Group will be created.

Additional Information

  • Please find the default implementation on this link. 

 

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