get_user does not returns specific roles

[dejudicibus]

If I use get_users to return only the 'authors' by using the following code:

$user_options = array(
  'orderby' => 'display_name',
  'order'   => 'ASC',
  'role'    => 'author',
  'who'     => 'authors'
); 
$all_authors = get_users($users_options); 
foreach ($all_authors as $author) {
 if ($author->ID > 1) {
   /* do something */
 }
}

I get back all users but admin, that is, also subscribers.

[scribu]

If you only want users with the 'author' role, remove the 'who' parameter. If you want all users who can create posts, remove the 'role' parameter. Using both doesn't make sense.

[nacin]

To further explain what is going on, 'who' => 'authors' selects all users of the blog who are not subscribers (using user_level != 0).

role=author is more restrictive. However, when who=authors is specified, $blog_id gets set to 0, which prevents role=author from being processed. The processing is a bit wonky, but this is proper behavior. Choose one or the other — who=authors is simply a shortcut that returns a superset of role=author.

You shouldn't be receiving subscribers back. who=authors should prevent that. Your subscribers likely have a wp_user_level of > 0, which is incorrect for subscribers.