Problem with frames; to many calls

Anon

Hello,

I have a strange error, I think. When using frames with PHP include HTML documents, on the server the frame-document-PHP-code is run more then once and session_objects are sometimes missing and again created.

We are using PHP version 4.0.3 on a Linux Red Hat environment.

The description. First I have a index.php with two frames; topframe.php and workframe.php. At the start of each of these three PHP-scripts I put a include of general.php. In this code I do a session_start() so that I can use session global variables in the three php-scripts.

When I set (session_register) a variable in index.php, I want to use this in topframe.php and workframe.php. But what happens; sometimes the registered variable is NOT there. Also by a refresh of the webpage, the index.php is called one time, but the two frame code two times!?

I can ONLY see this behavior when i put database logging in the general.php code; on screen (in browser) you don't see the second calls.

Below this message I have put the code listings and logging in database.

I hope someone can see what is going wrong.

Regards,
Gerald

Code listings;

bugindex.php:

<?php $BIlog_module='index.php'; require("bugging1.php"); ?>

<head>
</head>
<frameset rows="95,*" frameborder="NO" border="0" framespacing="0">
<frame name="topFrame" scrolling="NO" noresize src="topframe.php" >
<frame name="workFrame" noresize src="workframe.php">
</frameset>
<noframes><body bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
Your browser doesn't support FRAMES. 
</body></noframes>

topframe.php;

<?php $BIlog_module="top.php"; require("bugging1.php"); ?>

<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<META HTTP-EQUIV="pragma" CONTENT="no-cache">
<META HTTP-EQUIV="expires" CONTENT="31 dec 1999">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#6699FF" leftmargin="0" topmargin="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0">
 
TOP FRAME WINDOW (DOCUMENT) OBJECT
 
</body>

workframe.php;

<?php $BIlog_module='helpinfoWin.php'; require("bugging1.php"); ?>

<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#FFFFCC">
 
WORKFRAME WINDOW (DOCUMENT) OBJECT
 
</body>

PHP general code; BUGGING1.PGP;

<?PHP
session_start();

// set access
$hostname= (not shown)
$username= (not shown)
$password= (not shown)
$databasename= (not shown)

// Try access database
if (!($link=mysql_pconnect($hostname,$username,$password))) {
printf("Error connecting to host %s, by user %s",$hostname,$username);
exit(); }

// Select the database
if (!mysql_select_db($databasename,$link)) {
printf("Error selecting %s",$databasename);
exit(); }

if (session_is_registered("BIloggingcnt")) {
$logmessage="I-Use registered session object";
session_unregister("BIloggingcnt"); }
else {
$logmessage="I-Create new session object";
$BIloggingcnt=0; }

if (empty($BIlog_module)) { $BIlog_module="(not set)"; }

$BIloggingcnt=$BIloggingcnt + 1;
session_register("BIloggingcnt");

$timestamp=date("YmdHis",time());
$result=mysql_query("INSERT INTO logging (message,timestamp,module,sessionlogcnt) VALUES ('$logmessage','$timestamp','$BIlog_module',$BIloggingcnt)");
if (!($result)) { printf("E-Can not log messages in Logging table... %s",mysql_error()); }

Database logging:

id message timestamp module sessionlogcnt

1 I-Create new session object 20001027145134 index.php 1 Edit Delete
2 I-Use registered session object 20001027145134 helpinfoWin.php 2 Edit Delete
3 I-Use registered session object 20001027145134 top.php 3 Edit Delete
4 I-Use registered session object 20001027145134 top.php 4 Edit Delete
5 I-Use registered session object 20001027145134 helpinfoWin.php 5 Edit Delete
6 I-Use registered session object 20001027145146 index.php 6 Edit Delete
7 I-Create new session object 20001027145146 top.php 1 Edit Delete
8 I-Create new session object 20001027145146 helpinfoWin.php 1 Edit Delete
9 I-Use registered session object 20001027145146 top.php 7 Edit Delete
10 I-Use registered session object 20001027145146 helpinfoWin.php 8 Edit Delete
11 I-Use registered session object 20001027150740 index.php 9 Edit Delete
12 I-Create new session object 20001027150740 helpinfoWin.php 1 Edit Delete
13 I-Create new session object 20001027150740 top.php 1 Edit Delete
14 I-Use registered session object 20001027150740 top.php 10 Edit Delete
15 I-Use registered session object 20001027150740 helpinfoWin.php 11 Edit Delete

(the above logging is from first calling bugindex.php and then two times refreshing the browser window).

Anon

Gerald,
I have exactly the same problem- did you ever solve it????

stefan

Anon

No, no and again NO.

I'm thinking that it has something to do with the environment from my provider. Something with logging or clustering from his UNIX machines.

In my testenvironment, W'NT 4.0 with IIS 4.0, this problem does NOT happen. And the PHP and MySQL versions are exactly the same, only the platform with environment is different.

Can you describe your environment where this also happens?

Gerald

Anon

The test platfrom I am working on is:
NT 4.0, IIS 4.0 and I am conncecting
to a access db.

I looked at my way of session handling over the weekend.

I think in my setup I run into the problem that: the first frame opens a db connection to load all registered vars.
then it does an update call (to reset the timeout entry).

The second frame issues a select statement and then reads from the results.

My theory is, that the two frames are executed somewhat in parallel. So when the second frame issued its select query, the first frame executes its update query. When we get back to execute the read on the result in the second frame, the database suddenly changed and the results are not valid anymore. This then leads the second frame to "reset" the current session...

What i did to solve this: I introduced locking. I lock the db just before the udate call... Now it seems to work just fine.

I am not 100% sure if this was really the problem, but the error is gone :-D

Reading your initial mail, I asssume, that you are using php 4s session functions.

I don't know how felxible you are with these. I am currently using a own session class.... similar to the one found in phplib.

let me know on how you progress
stefan

p.s.: since access doesn't support manual locking of tables I switched to mysql...

Anon

Hmmm, looks if your are neer the solution. Have to do with parallel accessing the database from both frames.

I will try locking too. Get back with results, if found.

Thanks,
Gerald