function users_getspecialprefix () {

if [ $# -ne 2 ]; then
    echo "$0: supply a VO and a user-type as  arguments ! Exiting."
    return 1
fi

specvo=$1
specuser=$2

return=`
    awk --posix -F: '
	$6==specusr && $5==tolower(virtorg) {
	    sub(/[0-9]{1,4}$/, "", $2);
	    print $2;
	    exit
	}
    ' specusr=$2 virtorg=$specvo ${USERS_CONF}
`

if [ "$return" ]; then
    echo $return
    return 0
else
    echo "$FUNCNAME: could not find '$specuser' prefix for $specvo in ${USERS_CONF}" 1>&2
    return 1
fi

}
