Unable to login

Small percentage users can't login.

[krieves]

On the mortgage company website that I manage, we are finding that a small percentage of customers can't login. When they enter their loan number and PIN, they go back to the login page. The users that have complained say they are using IE (5.0, 5.5, or 6.0) on Windows (various flavors). They are not getting any errors, it just looks like the page refreshes. We are using session cookies and the users have said that cookies are enabled.

I can't replicate the problem so I'm having a difficult time trying to figure out why some people are experiencing this.

Has anyone run into this before? Could there be a problem with a cache?

Thanks for any suggestions.

[korkus2000]

What happens to the page if you hit the login process page without being validated? Are you redirected back to the login screen? Have you hit the login without cookies enabled. Does it do what they say? It honestly sounds like a cookie problem.

[Mardi_Gras]

>We are using session cookies and the users have said that cookies are enabled.

Is it possible they have cookies enabled in their browser but a third party application (like Zone Alarm or Norton) is blocking cookies?

[krieves]

When cookies are disabled, we display a warning page saying that, in order to login, you must have cookies enabled. I would agree that the problem sounds like a cookie problem, however users are saying that they are enabled and they are not getting the warning.

That's what got me wondering if there is some type of cache that stores session cookies temporarily along with some other stuff. If the cache gets full and session cookie can't get written to memory, would be page just refresh?

Just a shot in the dark...

We've asked people if it could be a firewall problem and everyone is saying no. It's a mix of people trying to login from home (aol, juno, etc) and from work (using all types of ISPs).

[edited by: krieves at 3:13 pm (utc) on Jan. 13, 2004]

[korkus2000]

What server-side language are you using?

[krieves]

We are using a product called Webspeed. It uses Progress as the underlying program language and database. The pages are written in HTML with embedded references to the Progress code. The pages are then compiled into a final file with and extension of .r. The Webspeed server then uses the .r to serve up HTML/Javascript/ to the visitor's browser.

[korkus2000]

Are you using SSL? Are there any problems with your certificates?

[krieves]

Yup, certificates are OK and up to date. This truely confounds me. :(

It's happened to enough people for there be reason for concern, but it's a small enough number to make it difficult to figure out. I can't see a common thread that connects the people that are having this problem.

[DrDoc]

Ask them to clear their cache and try again.

[AWildman]

Can you tail the log file when these people are saying that they are getting the error to see what is going on?

[krieves]

Our customer assistance department actually takes the phone calls, I'll suggest that they have the customers try to clear the cache to see if that works.

Unfortunately because we use Webspeed, our log files contain a bunch of garbage. These .r files are a pain in the butt.