Staying logged in and about cookies..

[Brian]

One of the constant problems I encounter here is people who seem to be constantly logged out of the forum every time they try and do something. This can be very irritating, especially after writing a long post and then losing it when hitting submit.

In this post, I hope to address this problem some have, and hopefully assist at least some of those experiencing this.

 

The first thing to note is that this is almost always caused by cookies. Those that don't know what they are..they are little settings that your browser accepts from a webpage that gives the browser instructions for future visits (well..roughly that anyways)

 

I am not immune myself from this problem. At home, I never have to log in at all. I am on XP, and use Firefox. But at work, using Win 7 and IE..I get constantly logged out. I have been trying numerous things, but am still experiencing the problem.

 

So let's start with the first advice I can give:

Always copy a long post before submitting. At least if you are logged out, you can go back and paste it again. Trust me...the one time you think you don't need to bother is when you will lose your post. So make it a habit to copy before sending. Right click.....copy.

 

Ok...the first step towards solving this is to make sure that on the login screen, you always check the box that says "Log me on automatically each visit"

If you are not having any problems staying logged in..no need to follow any of this advice at all. No need to fix things until they are broken

Ok...so once you have done that, try logging in and see if you stay logged in.

 

Before doing this, it would be a good idea to clear all of your cookies in your browser. Start afresh...and if you can't lose all of them, manually delete any to do with the 4 addresses below. Then log in and check the box above. Also a very good idea to clear your browser cache while you are at it.

 

The next thing to do is check whether your browser is accepting cookies. I can't go into detail here, but Google your browser and "accept cookies" and you should find out how to make sure your browser is not rejecting cookies. If you have cookie blocking software or high security levels, you might not be getting the cookie that keeps you logged in.

There is a place to type in websites to accept cookies from. It might be a good idea to add all of these:

www.militaria.co.za

militaria.co.za

http://www.nihontomessageboard.com

nihontomessageboard.com

 

Please note that if you are browsing the site with one of the url's above and have problems..please try one of the other links. http://www.militaria.co.za is the main site, and nihontomessageboard is a redirect.

 

Some internet ip's can make staying logged in very difficult. ISP's such as AOL etc can change your ip constantly, which makes you log out. Try another host for a short while if you are able to, and see if the situation improves.

Another important thing to try is another browser. It costs nothing to try out Firefox or Google Chrome or one of the others. You should not have only one browser on your pc. I am trying to eliminate all the possible causes and see which one is causing the problem.

 

While you are browsing, check your url in the browser and see if it ends with a bunch of letters and numbers such as http://www.militaria.co.za/nmb/viewforum.php?f=xx&sid=14ef1152rdwd2dr2ab3b9fbb101

If it ends with that &sid=xxxxxxx part....then your browser is not processing cookies properly, and that is what we need to solve.

 

I am fiddling with a bunch of settings in the hope of improving things. Please let me know here if there is any change for the worse or better.

 

Brian

[leo]

Hello, Brian!

Just for information:

I use XP in the office and Mac OSX at home, browser is Firefox in both systems.

Cookie suppression is at highest level except for my bookmarked sites. Still I have never experienced an unvoluntary logout. I´ve been using the same bookmark for your site since I became a member. Maybe an IE problem?

 

Greetings, Martin

[Brian]

Martin,

May be...I'm still trying to get to the bottom of it. I am really not a fan of IE, but can't force people to change, and don't want this thread to become a browser war discussion. Have to try and make it so it works for everyone or at least as many as possible.

I did change some cookie settings earlier tonight that might force people to log in once. No panic if that happens folks.

 

Brian

[Stephen]

I take it as a way to fight oldtimers, i have to log in each day and some time everytime after five my time, Brian thinks its AOL ...me i have grown used to it.

[Henry Wilson]

I have the same problem with my home computer, using FireFox. My work computer does not have the same problems. I have messed with the cookies and flush all I can flush but the problem persists at home.

[ububob]

I have only experienced that event twice since joining and I attribute it to an old machine running XP and IE and an ISP with some very arcane protocols. :?

[Lorenzo]

ahaha welcome to the club Brian... we had haaaaard times over following the iron brush for the same reason..

[Bugyotsuji]

Just this last week I have had to log in almost every visit, ever since I logged in from a computer in Portugal?

 

Good for the old memory cells though. I cannot log in at another similar Samurai site as I have forgotten the password...

 

Happened on IE in the office this morning. Just got home and I am logged out on Mozilla Firefox too, although the log-in software supplied my log-in name and dotted password for me before I could type them.