Since I'm personnally interested in this MOD, I'd like to give my inputs.
If I may suggest some replacement codes - due to missing components from index.php file, some missing calls from the WHERE statement and, since the $lang string were being used from the index.php file but not being called elsewhere, I added these statements in the correction below.
Replace :
//-----------------------------------------------------
// --- Newest username -----
//-----------------------------------------------------
$sql = "SELECT user_name, user_id
FROM ".USERS_TABLE."
WHERE user_level > ".USER_AWAITING."
ORDER BY user_id DESC";
$row = $site_db->query_firstrow($sql);
$newest_user ="<a href =\"".$site_sess->url(ROOT_PATH."member.php?action=showprofile&user_id=".$row['user_id'])."\"><b>".$row['user_name']."</b></a>";
$lang_newest_user = $lang['newest_user'];
$site_template->register_vars("newest_user", $newest_user);
unset($newest_user);
//-----------------------------------------------------
to :
//-----------------------------------------------------
// --- Newest username --------------------------------
//-----------------------------------------------------
$sql = "SELECT user_id, user_name
FROM ".USERS_TABLE."
WHERE user_level > ".USER_AWAITING." OR user_level > ".GUEST."
ORDER BY user_id DESC";
$row = $site_db->query_firstrow($sql);
$newest_user ="<a href =\"".$site_sess->url(ROOT_PATH."member.php?action=showprofile&user_id=".$row['user_id'])."\"><b>".$row['user_name']."</b></a>";
$site_template->register_vars(array(
"lang_newest_user" => $lang['newest_user']
));
$site_template->register_vars("newest_user", $newest_user);
unset($newest_user);
//-----------------------------------------------------
Now, assuming you're using the english version, in your lang/english/main.php file,
right above the : ' ?> ' tag,
add :
//-------------------------------------------------------
//--- Newest members ------------------------------------
//-------------------------------------------------------
$lang['newest_user'] = "Our newest user is: ";
Then, in your templates/<your_template>/home.html file,
add the two following tags where you want :
{if user_loggedin}{lang_newest_user}{newest_user}{endif user_loggedin}
These should clarify things.