cookies question

[Anon]

will the value of the cookies always be updated when recreate a new one?

[[deleted]]

What do you mean?

[Anon]

ok, my case is like this. I create some cookie when the user login, which is valid for 2 hours. Let said, if i straight away create another cookie with same name, but different value, will it cause any confliction?

another question is, recent, i am getting mad of my server. Because sometimes the session doesnt' work(for some time only). Now, i can create session at my server, but can't create any value via cookies. Any possible cause for this?

Thanks.
Louis

[[deleted]]

"will it cause any confliction?"

There can be only one cookie with name X.
If you create a cookie 'X' with value 'bla' and create a new cookie 'X' with value 'boo', the second cookie will overwrite the first cookie, and you will only see value 'boo'.

"Now, i can create session at my server, but can't create any value via cookies. Any possible cause for this?"

Make sure that you always send the PHPSESSID along to the next page. The simplest way is to use cookies. There is a setting in php.ini to enable this, check the PHP manual.

[Anon]

HI vincent,

could you please explain more on the PHPSESSID, possible a simple example. Here is the Session setting in my php.ini.

session.save_handler = files ; handler used to store/retrieve data
session.save_path = /tmp ; argument passed to save_handler
; in the case of files, this is the
; path where data files are stored
session.use_cookies = 1 ; whether to use cookies
session.name = PHPSESSID
; name of the session
; is used as cookie name
session.auto_start = 0 ; initialize session on request startup
session.cookie_lifetime = 0 ; lifetime in seconds of cookie
; or if 0, until browser is restarted
session.cookie_path = / ; the path the cookie is valid for
session.cookie_domain = ; the domain the cookie is valid for
session.serialize_handler = php ; handler used to serialize data
; php is the standard serializer of PHP
session.gc_probability = 1 ; percentual probability that the
; 'garbage collection' process is started
; on every session initialization
session.gc_maxlifetime = 86400 ; after this number of seconds, stored
; data will be seen as 'garbage' and
; cleaned up by the gc process
session.referer_check = ; check HTTP Referer to invalidate
; externally stored URLs containing ids
session.entropy_length = 0 ; how many bytes to read from the file
session.entropy_file = ; specified here to create the session id
; session.entropy_length = 16
; session.entropy_file = /dev/urandom
session.cache_limiter = nocache ; set to {nocache,private,public} to
; determine HTTP caching aspects
session.cache_expire = 180 ; document expires after n minutes

Thanks
Louis

[Anon]

hey louis
I am facing the similar kind of problem.

I had been using sessions in my script which were functioning normaly. but when i inserted cookies for some special reasons along with the sessions, i have ben facing problems.

eg the correct value for $variable1 in session is not being posted to next page and is being replaced by a null string. However the cookies are being set normally and are picking the correct stored values.

Notice that $variable1 is registered in session only, not in cookies. Cookies are meant to set other variables and are doing that task normally.

Please tell me if you have got the solution.

[mikefn]

Guys,

Are you using cookies for holding values of variables?
Did you use forms for your code?
example:
<input type="text" name="try1" value=<? echo "$sess_array[try1]" ?> size=10 max=10>
Then the value will stay there until you reset the session.
Hope this helps ... 🙂

Mike

[[deleted]]

Q: why would you want to send session data through a form?

[mikefn]

Example you have forms in page 1, then you want to pass along all the data of the form variables in page 1 to page 2, page 3, and page 4. If the person goes back to page 1, then the value of the variable stays, unless there's a reset session.

[Anon]

Dear Mike,
i am using cookies for holding values of variables

and the session variables are being used to run sql queries against a particular user and getting his/her data, not as form variables.
Please help.
Dipika