Warning: Unknown(): Your script possibly relies on a session side-effect which existe

irateelf

My code is giving me this error message, and I can't figure out why. I have done nothing different than in any of my other pages and they don't give me this error. I am simply using the $_SESSION array. I have read a few threads in various places on this problem but they haven't been much help. I don't have access to the .ini file to change any php settings so what else can I do?

rehfeld

post the relevant code

devinemke

from the manual:
http://www.php.net/manual/en/ref.session.php#ini.session.bug-compat-42

session.bug_compat_42 (boolean)
PHP versions 4.2.0 and lower have an undocumented feature/bug that allows you to to initialize a session variable in the global scope, albeit register_globals is disabled. PHP 4.3.0 and later will warn you, if this feature is used, and if session.bug_compat_warn is also enabled.

session.bug_compat_warn (boolean)
PHP versions 4.2.0 and lower have an undocumented feature/bug that allows you to to initialize a session variable in the global scope, albeit register_globals is disabled. PHP 4.3.0 and later will warn you, if this feature is used by enabling both session.bug_compat_42 and session.bug_compat_warn.

irateelf

I have read this in the php manual and similar things in other forums but it doesn't seem to help me. What exactly does 'initialise a session variable in the global scope' mean? The only references I have to sessions are of the type:

 $_SESSION[value] = $value

, and a single call to session_destroy() which I have used in the same manner on another page without this problem.
Rehfeld: the reason I didn't post the relevant code is because I don't know what the relevant code is other than it is contained in a certain page, which incidently contains many many lines of php code - ie 100's. I wasn't sure if it was a good idea posting that much code...[

devinemke

if you don't wish to see these errors simply set these two php.ini directives to false.

irateelf

I don't have access to the php.ini file, any other ideas?

tsinka

Hi,

either add two ini_set lines

ini_set('session.bug_compat_42',0);
ini_set('session.bug_compat_warn',0);

on top of the scripts showing that error or if you're using apache (and the usage of .htaccess files is enabled) then create a .htaccess file in the DOCUMENT_ROOT directory that contains the two lines

php_flag session.bug_compat_42 0
php_flag session.bug_compat_warn 0

However, the cleanest way is to modify the scripts so that they don't cause that warnings to be displayed.

Thomas