Cookie Problem

[The Hobo]

Do browsers do their cookies differently? On my bulletin boards, a user logs in in IE then opens Netscape and has to log in again because Netscape doesn't find the cookie. Same with Opera.

This wouldn't be so much of a problem, but on the user tracking (showing the Users Online) it'll start to list the people more than once because it doesn't find the sessionID cookie.

I know I can work around it and check in the database to see if the user is already there, but that's not going to work for guests.

So does anyone know why netscape wont recognize/find the cookies?

[Rick Bull]

I'm pretty sure they store them in different locations. I think IE stores them in Windows\Temporary Internet Files and Netscape stores them somewhere in it's own directory. Plus they use different formats for saving so even if they were in the same location I don't think they'd be able to read on another's cookie.

[Gimlin]

All browsers store cookies in different places. It not that big a problem, most people dont switch very often.

[chrisjk]

You can't do anything about that, anything that uses cookies will suffer the same problem

Only list each person once in your Users Online...as for guests, well, it doesn't matter because effectively that person is two (or more) guests. This board has the same problem AFAIK

[cpradio]

Netscape (and Opera, I think) require cookies to have the domain parameter filled out and it must have 2 periods in it (the reason why I use $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'] as the domain parameter).

-Matt

[The Hobo]

Originally posted by cpradio
Netscape (and Opera, I think) require cookies to have the domain parameter filled out and it must have 2 periods in it (the reason why I use $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'] as the domain parameter).

-Matt

That's not going to fix the problem, though, is it?

[Gimlin]

Vbulletin cant fix it, why bother.

[ParadoxMember]

I had a similar problem, and could not find a way around it, the only thing I did do was to delete the cookie as soon as the browser was closed, but that does not help you in the way of opening multiple browsers..

[cpradio]

Originally posted by The Hobo
That's not going to fix the problem, though, is it?

By doing it via HTTP_POST(to ensure NS/Opera stores your cookies) if you store the Username, Password, and Session Id via cookies you can cross reference them for matches already placed in the Currently Online/User Tables for validation. Also you can set a cookie that keeps their IP address and cross reference that too.