Include Template Based on User IP Address

Question

I need to prohibit certain IP Address from visiting my wordpress site. Hence i have used below code in my child theme function.php

add_action('template_include', 'restrict_user_access');
function restrict_user_access() {
    $ipAddress = $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'];

        if($ipAddress === 'XX.XX.XXX.XXX') {
            return "home/www/html/blog/wp-content/themes/theme-child/restrictusers.php";
        }
    }
}

I can able to load this template & display the content for this IP whereas for other IP Address i get empty page.

Am i missing any?

My wordpress version is 4.9.10.

I also need to replicate this same process in other wordpress site v5.0.2.

Answer 1

template_include is a filter - it takes one argument and it should always return a value (a template to include).

Your function doesn’t do that. It doesn’t take any arguments and it returns value only if the condition is true - so if it’s not, it returns no value, so no template will be included in such case.

Here’s the fix:

add_action('template_include', 'restrict_user_access');
function restrict_user_access( $template ) {
    $ipAddress = $_SERVER['REMOTE_ADDR'];

        if($ipAddress === 'XX.XX.XXX.XXX') {
            return "home/www/html/blog/wp-content/themes/theme-child/restrictusers.php";
        }
    }

    return $template;
}

Another problem is that you should never use absolute paths in such filters. There are functions that will help you locate the template based on its file. So instead of this:

return "home/www/html/blog/wp-content/themes/theme-child/restrictusers.php";

You should do this:

$tpl = locate_template( array( 'restrictusers.php' ) );
if ( $tpl ) return $tpl;