I am working on a plugin that restricts validated users to viewing and reading content.  Upon registering, I create metadata with an access_id of 99:

function tc_access_create_visitor($event, $object_type, $object) {

 // add metadata

 if (($object) && ($object instanceof ElggUser)) {
  define("ACCESS_VISITOR",99);
  create_metadata($object->guid, "visitor", "yes","", $object->guid, ACCESS_VISITOR);
 }

}

Users cannot add or edit content (i.e., add blogs, create groups, send messages, etic.) until an admn "Activates" them by setting the access_id back to 2 using an activate action page. I see the change in the database for the user I activated. However, upon login the same user is still unable to add or edit content, eventhough the database has been updated with an access_id of 2.

I am using the following function in the start.php page to check for the access_id of 99:

register_plugin_hook('action', 'blog/add', 'tc_access_check_hook');

function tc_access_check_hook($hook, $entity_type, $returnvalue, $params) {
 
 //global $CONFIG;
 $user_id = get_loggedin_userid();
 $count = "";
 global $visitor_allowed;
 $sql = "SELECT DISTINCT access_id FROM `elgg`.`elgg_metadata` WHERE entity_guid = '{$user_id}' AND access_id = '99' ";
 $result = get_data($sql);
 
 if (count($result) > 0) {
  
  register_error(elgg_echo("Not allowed."));
  forward($_SERVER['HTTP_REFERER']);
  exit;
  
 }
}

The code is not retrieving the updated access_id of 2 for the logged in user. Any comments you may have to read in the updated access_id is much appreciated.