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Problems setting cookies with PHP

[macmuso]

I have a site, and what I want to do is set it up so that the first time a user goes there, they have to type in their name, and from then on, whenever they visit index.php their name is remembered, and displayed as, 'welcome back, joe bloggs'. What I have done is set up the site so the php script goes as follows:

if(isset($username))

{?>

...the main page I want to display - including

"welcome back, <? echo $name?> 

...

<? }

else{

setcookie(username,$name,time()+$cookielife);

?>

...The page with the form, which has method="get" and action="index.php"....

<? }

?>

Something is wrong here, because when I load the page, it asks me for my name, then I click submit, and the same page comes up and asks for my name again. However, if I click refresh or submit again, the correct page loads! What is making this happen? Different things happen when I shift the setcookie() around, am I putting it in the right place?

[andreasfriedrich]

Let me welcome you to WebmasterWorld [webmasterworld.com] macmuso.

If you havenīt done it yet I suggest you read Marciaīs WebmasterWorld Welcome and Guide to the Basics [webmasterworld.com] post which contains a lot of helpful information.

Have you checked whether caching is an issue.

I got something similar to work using code along these lines:

disable_caching 
if(name) { 
 setcookie 
 cookie = name 
} 
if(cookie) { 
 print cookie 
} else { 
 print form 
}

Andreas

[macmuso]

Also... after the first visit, all it says is "welcome back,!". Do I have to code something that loads the cookie or is it available all the time? Is it going to make any difference if I use the

if(isset($username))

or the

if(isset(!$username))

and switch the two possible pages around?

[andreasfriedrich]

On the page that is displayed after the form is submitted the cookie does not exist yet. The server will send the cookie in the response header with this page.

To make the name appear on that page you need to use the value supplied by the submitted form. That is what the

cookie = name

does in my pseudo code.

Here is how the pseudo code would look like in real PHP code.

<? 
# prevent caching 
header("Expires: Mon, 26 Jul 1997 05:00:00 GMT"); 
header("Last-Modified: " . gmdate("D, d M Y H:i:s") . " GMT");  
header("Cache-Control: no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate"); 
header("Cache-Control: post-check=0, pre-check=0", false); 
header("Pragma: no-cache");     
# 
# If the form is submitted $_GET['name'] will contain the name 
if($_GET['name']) { 
 # the cookie will be added to the response header which 
 # is sent back to the browser along with this page 
 setcookie('username', $_GET['name']); 
 # since the cookie does not exist on the client side yet 
 # we set the variable to the submitted value 
 $_COOKIE['username'] = $_GET['name']; 
} 
# if we have a username, display it 
if(isset($_COOKIE['username'])) {?> 
<p>Hallo <?=$_COOKIE['username']?></p> 
<?} 
# otherwise display the form to get the username 
else 
{?> 
<form><input name="name" type="input"><input type="submit"></form> 
<?}?>

Andreas

[macmuso]

Thanks it works great now :)