My sessions keep expiring

[jimbob]

Hi,

I am trying to use session variables to store information about users - such as their name and perferences etc.

I start each page with: session_start();

and then get the variable from the session array: $user_firstname = $HTTP_SESSION_VARS['user_firstname'];

However, I am finding that the session seems to lose the variables after a few minutes. 😕 It is as if the session has expired. Does anyone know why this is? Can I make the session last longer - maybe a couple of hours?

Thanks in advance,

Jimbo

[weekender]

use [man]ini_set[/man]

ini_set("session.cache_expire", "180");

this sets the value for php.ini (ie the default)

or [man]session_cache_expire[/man]

session_cache_expire(180);

the 180 value is the number of minutes to keep the session alive (after the most recent session_start()) before destroying the session.

adam

[jimbob]

Thanks Adam. Good to see someone else from Oxford. 🙂

[weekender]

oh crikey! cool, what do you do in oxford? i'm a student, and also work for a local IT consultancy as a contractor

[jimbob]

I live just outside oxford, in a little village called Wardington. I've just graduated from Imperial College, London. Now work for small company developing websites and products.

It's a small world.