session_cache_limiter('public')--oops!

[sfullman]

Well, some nice person told me about the above function session_cache_limiter('public'), which ended those nasty "warning: page has expired messages, it's not like my pages are anything out of the ordinary, just searching will use form posts and those warnings are obnoxious.

Well, now I have another problem. I put this:

session_cache_limiter('public');

at the start of the script, and I can hit the back button on the browser till the cows come home, BUT...

Now, if I have added a record to a list, I can't display the new list item, EVEN IF I HIT REFRESH.

There must be some happy medium that will let (me or someone) hit the back button and yet allow a refresh when I need it.

Thank you for your help.
Sam

[crislewis]

I got so fed up with trying to handle this issue that I gave up. I read a post somewhere that you should always try and take a user forward and never back. So now if a user submits a form with an error I redisplay the form with the data entered along with the errors (field highlighting is useful here too).

Now users never have to use 'back' and I don't have to worry that the data will have disappeared or not refreshed.

It gives an all together better user experience and somehow it helps to maintain control.

Cheers,

Cris

[sfullman]

Yes, however, sometimes, when you're searching through a database for records, you WANT to go back to a differnent view, it's conceivable you could go through a series of 3-4 pages with a form submission each time, and want to go BACK. Anyway, it seems there must be a happy medium: I can go back and get the old view, but if I hit refresh I can repost the form data. As much as I disliked ASP, I didn't have that problem. (Maybe I should use PHP to view the raw header on some ASP files and see what they use -- certainly this can be DONE, there just has to be an easier way than that.)

Sam Fullman
Compass Point Media