Cookie, posting and log in problems

[alsakher]

vBulletin 2.0 FINAL will be Released on Monday >>> and I have not found any SOLUTION of this big problem which makes most members who experience this problem to leave our forums with no return !!

The problem has been described and heavily discussed in this thread:

http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=15444&highlight=cookies


The problem as described by one member who has experienced it is:

(( I'm experiecing the exact same problems. I can log into the Forums without a problem. As soon as I try to post, it tells me I'm not logged in. When I re-enter the username and password, it accepts it and then puts me in the newthread window where I can now type a new post. After typing a post and clicking submit, it tells me I'm not logged in. .... and so on !!!! )))

--------------------------------

Iam sorry to open new thread for same problem but I have been waiting long time (since 4/28/2001) to find any solution?

:mad: :mad: :mad:

Please if anybody has heared about a good and clear solution of this problem to let me know about it.

Thanks

www.alsakher.com

------------------------------
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ÑãíÊß íÇÍØÈ ÐßÑÇí Ýí ÈÑÏ ÇáãÓÇÝÉ äÇÑ ..

[Nicholas Brown]

http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=109065#post109065

[alsakher]

Nicholas

Do you want me to ask every single member to check where his cookies are stored in !!!!!!!

Most members do not even tell that they faced a problem, they just leave your web site when they could not do nothing !!

[Mas*Mind]

Still the same problem here! I just wanted to post it again, but saw your thread in time...

http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=15353

The sympthoms are: Members CAN login, are recognized as that particular member, but just can't post...

Everytime they see this message:


You are not logged in or you do not have permission to access this page. This could be due to one of several reasons:
You are not logged in. Fill in the form at the bottom of this page and try again.
You do not have permission to access the page that you were trying to. Are you trying to edit someone else's post or trying to access administrative features? Check that you are allowed to perform this action in the Forum Rules.
If you are trying to post, the administrator may have disabled your account, or it may be awaiting activation.
Logged in user: <USERNAME> [logout]


The administrator may have required you to register before you can view this page. Forgotten your password?


So they ARE logged in AND recognized as that user... All accessrights are how they should...

Clearing cookies doesn't help...

[Kier]

So they are definitely in the registered user group, rather than the awaiting activation group?

[Mas*Mind]

Yes, most definitely...

In fact; All (or most) of them were allready registered before I upgraded from 1.1.3

[Remi]

I am not an expert but this is waht happend

I had this problem from the first day I upgraded to VB2 but this was the answer to all of my problems.

UPDATE user SET nosessionhash=1
UPDATE user SET cookieuser=1

Now after each upgrade I find that some users swiched again to eithr

nosessionhash=0
cookieuser=1
or
nosessionhash=1
cookieuser=0

So I run this command after the upgrade

Note: almost all of my users are comming frome behind a proxy.

[Mas*Mind]

I've allready disabled the sessionhash, because it's too insecure

So all users are cookieusers...

[RobAC]

I had the same problem a few weeks ago. I'll see if I can find the thread. I had to prevent the user from using cookies and set him to use sessionhash.

Incidentally, when I changed everyone's setting to use cookies last week, he claims it's still working fine for him.:confused:

[Remi]

They have to be
nosessionhash=1
cookieuser=1
other wise VB will aske to login over and over even if you are loged in.

If you have
nosessionhash=0
cookieuser=0

It works but it is not a practical to aske the user to inter their password and userID every time.

I am sure of that because I am able to duplicate the problem any time.

[Mas*Mind]

My configurations on this board are:

nosessionhash=1
cookieuser=1

and I CAN post....

All those configs should work, regardless of other settings..

I'm sure I have many users (including me) on my board, who use the above setting and CAN post...

So plz fix this (bug?), I have many users who can't post now for a couple of weeks...

[alsakher]

Originally posted by Kier
So they are definitely in the registered user group, rather than the awaiting activation group?

Yes they are definitely in the registered user group, some of them have more than 500 posts and have never changed their email addresses.

-------------------

[Mas*Mind]

was there any update on this in the latest release?

[Dragon]

I've been having occasional problems with people not being able to login properly either after registering.

But the latest problem is a real doozy. I have a long-time user who now (after the release of 2.0.0, it never happened with betas or RCs) can only post new threads, but not follow up to old ones! And it seems to have to do with cookies, here's what he says:


It does still screw up each time after a post though. I have to exit Nutscrape, delete the cookie file, restart Nutscrape and login manually.

The version of "Nutscrape" he's talking about is Netscape 4.72, BTW.

[ocps]

this happens on my board too...they are loggeed in and cant post...how did u fix this..i dont understand what u posted? sorry..im not good with this

[Aunt Jemima]

I have the same exact problem - It seems to happen only when cookies are cleared and you haven't 'loged-out'.


:confused:

[ocps]

i dont kno why it happens, i just opend my board and the first person told me she registered, confimed..could edit her profile but when she tried to post said she wasnt logged in, just like that other guy said...but ive also had users to not experience it yet, i think she is running a pc from her school, so it might have a different proxy or something..i dunno

[Wayne Luke]

Everyone try this workaround. It might lead the developers in the proper direction.

Make sure that guest "Can View Board".

Go to Control Panel -> User Groups and Permissions -> Unregistered/Not Logged In and set "Can View Board" to Yes.

Please let us know if you have anymore problems.

This bug has not been reproduced on development servers or many test forums since beta 4 therefore it is very difficult to find a fix for it.

[Aunt Jemima]

Originally posted by wluke
Everyone try this workaround. It might lead the developers in the proper direction.

Make sure that guest "Can View Board".

Go to Control Panel -> User Groups and Permissions -> Unregistered/Not Logged In and set "Can View Board" to Yes.

Please let us know if you have anymore problems.

This bug has not been reproduced on development servers or many test forums since beta 4 therefore it is very difficult to find a fix for it.

Still get the same problem Luke.

[RobAC]

Wayne,

I've always had it set so that Unregistered users could view the boards, and I've had similar problems in the past.

I followed Kier's instructions in a previous thread and set everyone to use cookies in the database. I've also set it in the registration forms and usercp options and removed the options to change them from those templates.

From what I can tell, everyone is now using cookies on my forums, however there are still some users that are set to not use cookies when I view their profiles in the Admin cp, but so far, I haven't heard anyone having problems with access. (fingers crossed)

[hubba]

Same Problem at my Forum. Some (not many) people can write NEW posts, but not reply. Also in the forumsmainpage the postingsdates does not correspondent with the ones in the Forum.

[hubba]

Hm, I just deletet all the cookies. Then I logged in, and saw that in the cookiesfolder of Win 2000 have been created 2 (!!) cookies, exact the same ones... is this correct?

[cobradude]

I have tried turning on no cache headers, changing everone to use cookies, and nothing seems to fix it.

I am getting at least 10 messages a day where people can't log in and post, or they are someone else. :mad:

The other thing I notice is that I very rarely have more than one guest, while I have maybe 40 members on line. I know there's lots of lurkers, so it just can't be that everyone who visits is a member.

PLEASE HELP US!

[Mike Sullivan]

Actually, this is where setting people NOT to use cookies is helpful -- the session should propagate through the pages correctly as it won't rely on cookies.

[Mas*Mind]

Originally posted by Ed Sullivan
Actually, this is where setting people NOT to use cookies is helpful -- the session should propagate through the pages correctly as it won't rely on cookies.

True Ed, but wouldn't you agree this is a poor solution? It's still not working for some members while it should. Sessionhashes are too insecure for me, so I disabled it.

[robertusss]

I personally don't have the problem, but many users of our board do!

I somehow think it has to do with the password. Many users report the problem right after they changed their passwort.

What happens when the password that is stored in the cooky does not match the password in the database? Could that be the problem?



I cannot test it, because I have a range of other problems on my system and I can't garantee a bug-free client right now.

[Mike Sullivan]

Originally posted by Mas*Mind
Sessionhashes are too insecure for me, so I disabled it. Unless you're sharing links with someone directly (say, ICQ) and they have the same IP and user agent, there's nothing insecure about them.

robertuss -- that's a possibility, although vB does try to kill the cookies if the password in your cookie is incorrect.

[brookelyn]

many of my users have reported the same problem described by others in this post. i haven't experienced it myself and haven';t been able to reproduce it, but it doesn't mean that it doesn't exist - i hope you guys figure out what's going on and get it fixed.

[Vigile]

I started a test forum on my site, so I could test the vb 2.0 before launching it....

It's a good thing I did...

Every user that I have had join the NEW forum (using 2.0 and a new database) is having this same problem. The only user that doesn't have this problem is the one I created during setup.

http://www.amdmb.com/vb2/

See for yourself there, VB Admins.

Here is the problem:



vBulletin Message and stuff
You are not logged in or you do not have permission to access this page. This could be due to one of several reasons:
You are not logged in. Fill in the form at the bottom of this page and try again.

You do not have permission to access the page that you were trying to. Are you trying to edit someone else's post or trying to access administrative features? Check that you are allowed to perform this action in the Forum Rules.

If you are trying to post, the administrator may have disabled your account, or it may be awaiting activation.

Logged in user: Vigile [logout]


The administrator may have required you to register before you can view this page. Forgotten your password?




You can see, I am logged in on the site, but am unable to post new threads or reply. I can log into my CP just fine and change options, however.

PLEASE, please, please stop ignoring this bug and fix it!

[cobradude]

I love everything about vBulletin except this issue!!

1. Never more than one (maybe 2) guests show, and everyone else is a member.
2. Many people are mailing me telling me they can't post.
3. Many people are mailing me because they can't log off (trying to log off to get passed this issue).
4. I had to force people to use cookies because tons of members were mailing me because they were showing up as different people, and even posting messages under different members names. Now I have this. What's better? I don't know, I have to reply to MANY mails per day. :mad:
5. I'm loosing members! :mad:

This IS a problem of some kind. If it's some sort of admin setting, It must be documented extremely well, because this obviously is causing more than a few people grief, and I've tried all that people have suggested. This is overwhelming me daily, and taking the fun out of this whole thing for me and many of my members.

Maybe it would help if we forwarded all of our complaining members mail to you guys at vBulletin. :D

[cobradude]

-----Original Message-----
From: Tgconklin@
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 9:52 PM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Can't log in

Brent - I can't reply to a post because I can't log in. I've tried to log in
every way possible, no dice. I logged in earlier tonight and posted three
times with no problem, but now it isn't working. I'm sure there is some
problem that you're probably fixing as I type, so no big deal. Just thought
I'd let you know.

Bumpster

************************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: Joey Mestres
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 9:12 PM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Cannot access site

Brent,

The site won't let me log in - it shows me logged in but won't let me post -
then I follow your instructions - but there is no log out button. So I
delete all cookies - restart computer and go in again - and same stuff.

Any ideas?

Have I been banned?????

Tom aka MiamiCobra

************************************************** **
This guy is reporting he posted a message, and it shows as being from another member. (I get several of these a week)

-----Original Message-----
From: Evan Harris
Sent: Saturday, May 26, 2001 12:22 PM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Why does my post come in under Blackcobra

Brent:

Need Help. Why did my last post under ERA v. Shelby come in under Blackcobra?

Evan Harris

************************************************
-----Original Message-----
From: James Holden, Jr.
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 8:16 PM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Password

Brent:
Here we go again... I keep trying to post to a thread, it asks me for my password, I log in and then it sez no thread identified and around I go again.

What am I doing wrong?

Jim Holden
***********************************************
-----Original Message-----
From: sudans2
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 5:39 PM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Log In Problems

Brent,
I tried to log in to post several times today to no avail. I tried the re-entry that you suggested and still no luck. Any suggestions?
Looking forward to meeting you at “The DV Spring Fling”

Dan
************************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: Michael A. Coffman
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 4:16 PM
To: Brent Mills
Subject: Can't reply to posts or use your "Contact Us" link

Brent,

I can now view post OK. I am no longer using the web filter. However, I am unable to reply to posts or to use your "contact us" link. When I try to reply to a post it seems to think I'm not logged in. So I log in and still no go. When I try to use the "contact us" link it rejects it saying "must specify a return address Mail and News preferences". Any ideas?

Thanks, Mike (AKA FIA Mike)
***********************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: Thorin
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 4:44 PM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Am I On Somebody's List?

Brent,

I have been having trouble being recognized by Club Cobra for 2 or 3 weeks - you mentioned you were working on some problems around 5/9. But today, I can log on, but still only be able to see my subscribed to list. I can't post a reply, new post, change my password or any of that type of thing. I am running Microsoft Internet Explorer v5.5. Me, or just teething problems with the new board software?

David Lowell
Thorin
*********************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: Corey Zimmerman
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 1:53 PM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Log-in

I don't know if this is the right place to write but the web site seems to have me confused. When I visit the site it thinks that I am Brent Mills and I can't seek to figure out how to correct the problem. I am not Brent. Please tell me what I can do to correct the system. Thanks.

Corey Zimmerman

"Zimmy"

Zimy@knight-hub.com

[cobradude]

-----Original Message-----
From: stuart sherman
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 8:54 PM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: posting reply

Brent,

Saw your announcement regarding posting problems. I do not see the log out icon on the /index.php page. I erased my cookies but no change.

Stush
rfbrQU
*********************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: Fritz Philipps
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 1:37 PM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: bender5

Hallo Brent !

Today I logged in Cobra Talk and your programm named me "bender5". Who is bender5 ???
My profil is cob289 !
What happend to the system?

All the best from germany Fritz
*******************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: stuart sherman
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 8:19 PM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: forum

Brent,

When I click on post reply it brings me to the login page which I do then it brings me back to a page thread unspecified. When I go back to home and try to post reply I have to login again and again back to page unspecified and so on ...never get to reply. Whats up?

Stush
PW: rfbrQU
********************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: Mr Smith
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 11:43 AM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Still no luck posting, Joe Smith


Brent, I am still unable to post on Club Cobra.
I am open to suggestions as to what to do.( I am
not having any trouble on other sites as far as
posting messages.)

Joe Smith WMdaC6


***********************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: Mr Smith
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 11:43 AM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Still no luck posting, Joe Smith


Brent, I am still unable to post on Club Cobra.
I am open to suggestions as to what to do.( I am
not having any trouble on other sites as far as
posting messages.)

Joe Smith WMdaC6
***********************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: Priveye
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 9:45 AM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Inability to post

Brent,
I've totally lost my ability to post or email through the forum. It keeps
prompting me to login; although I'm logged in on the index page. It seems
to loop me through the forums but never logs me in to the point that I can
post.
I've logged out and tried it again, I've re-booted my system. Any ideas??
Roscoe
********************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: Pete Johnson
Sent: Friday, May 25, 2001 7:46 AM
To: brent@clubcobra.com
Subject: Posting Problems

Brent,
I am still having a problem replying to mrbruce. Please help.
Thanks, Pete
********************************************

[alsakher]

hi

I would like to let you know that I have solved the problem for many members by asking them to modify their options to the following:

-------------------------
From (user cp) --> Edit options : Make sure of the following settings:


1- Automatically login when you return to the site? (uses cookies): Answer should be ((( Yes)))


2- Browse board with cookies? Answer should be ((( NO )))


(specially and most importantly the second one)

This solution has been worked fine for everybody who faced the problem.,, but still Iam not sure it is the ideal solution because i have no good background of what is going on in the cookies business :) :)

NOTE : I could also reproduce this problem with one member who was online on messanger with me and I asked him to play with these two options (with all combinations) and we could reproduce the problem when (wrong) answers are used.

----------------------
ÍÇØÈ áíá

[robertusss]

:confused: ... that's funny, because I use both settings to "no" for a workaround!

If we speak about the same problem, than this narrows down the problem to cookie-option no.2: Browse board with cookies?


@ all you other Webmasters : change the cookie-options of a user complaining and see what settings help your boards and report us here!

Also please ask users if that problem occured after they changed their password (which is definitly the point of problem at our forums!)


@vbulletin-developers: is it 100% sure, that vBulletin is able to change/delete all cookies it can read? I mean over the months the forum-cookies of our users were set by several generations of vBulletins (installed under several urls)?

[tubedogg]

vBulletin is only able to edit/delete cookies that were set under the exact same URL & path as when trying to edit/delete them. This is the same for any other site/script that sets cookies.

[cobradude]

Thanks for the input guys. I tried the suggestions, but I'm still getting mail pouring in.

I even went ahead updated everyone to the settings that alsakher had suggested, but people are still sending me mail.

What the heck??



Still, I never see more than 1 maybe 2 guests on my site, but up to 44 members at once. This doesn't make sense, as I know many people browse the site, so guests are showing up as members. Any ideas on this???

[RobAC]

I'm curious.....what do you have your cookie path set to in your admin cp?

[cobradude]

Rob, in my efforts to try and fix the problem where guests are showing up as members, I changed the cookie path to "/ ." Looks like it should have been "/" only without the period. My stupid mistake. :rolleyes:

Things are looking a little better....BUT....I am still getting plenty of guests saying they are showing up as members, and they ARE able to post under different usernames.

[tamarian]

I don't have this problem on my forum (or at least no user have reported it!) But I noticed something that might spark an idea of what might be the cause, if not, never mind. :)

I changed my pw, and since then, I always have to login whenever I close my browser and open it again. I have my options set to login automatically, and use cookies. I don't use confirmation email.

I use IE 5.5 and haven't changed a thing, other forums, like VB, recognize me with no problems.

Hope this helps, as I feel your pain (both users and dev team!) :(

[robertusss]

Originally posted by tubedogg
vBulletin is only able to edit/delete cookies that were set under the exact same URL & path as when trying to edit/delete them. This is the same for any other site/script that sets cookies.

so, let's say I changed the URL or the path: could there be circumstances where it is possible for vB to read the cookie but not to delete/edit it?

[Mike Sullivan]

Originally posted by robertusss
so, let's say I changed the URL or the path: could there be circumstances where it is possible for vB to read the cookie but not to delete/edit it? Yes. That's actually in the cookie spec: cookies can only be deleted/edited under the same circumstances they were created.

If you set your path to /, and then change it to /forum, your browser would check for a /forum cookie and not find any. Then it would look at the / cookie. If you try to delete a cookie, and analyze the actual headers, it will try to delete the /forum cookie.

[robertusss]

OK, just to have this 100% clear:

Let's say a user created a cookie when the path was "/" - then webmaster changed the path to "/forum".
In that situation:
a.) the forum is able to read the cookie and identify the user
b.) the forum is not able to change/delete that cookie


Because if this (a and b) is what's happening - we have at least my problem: When user changes his password in this situation:
Because of a.) he is identified as an valid user - the forum accepts the new password and stores it the database
and because of b.) the forum is not able to ubdate the cookie!

From that point of time on we have an uncorrect cookie with an non-matching password!


correct me if I am wrong.

[Mike Sullivan]

robertusss -- yes, that's correct. As a matter of fact, that's the same example I just gave :)

[robertusss]

sorry Ed, but I am posting these problems for weeks now and nobody ever really responded on my "could it be the cookie save path"-questions.



could someone PLEASE write a small script to kill cookies with another save path.
Because of "the effect" also the regular logout-routines do not work - would be nice to offer the user an alternate link like "if you have troubles logging out or logging in try using this link and log in again".

[robertusss]

I PLEASE do not tell me to tell my users to erease the cookies on their local harddrive by hand.
We talk about users that hang around in Internet forums - not computer technicians...

[Mike Sullivan]

Well there are step by step instructions on how to kill your IE cookies for a domain in the FAQ. I'll see if I can come up with something though.

[Vociferous]

The cookies folder for my forum has been the same since the board went live. So I know that isn't the problem.

Here's what I've noticed so far and gleaned from my users.

* IE - 4.0 -> 5.5 work fine, no problems with either cookies or sessions.

* Netscape 4.75 and 6.0 do have the problems.

* Mozilla builds (http://mozilla.org) also have the same problem as Netscape.

[Vociferous]

In addition to not being able to post new or reply to threads.

When accessing an area like the user control panel I recieve the same problem. (When using Netscape).

[dxb]

this problem is driving me crazy and I never had it with the beta versions and suddenly I get all kind of emails telling me we cant post >>>>we cant post


I thought it's just some of the users but while i was working on the board I started having the same problem


and I have it even when I'm in the control panel and thats making my job really hard


now can we have a solution for this problem or it will stay without one like my other problem

http://vbulletin.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18563

which I didnt even get an answer from the moderator or an advise


I hope i will get a solution for this problem because it's costing me majer lost of users

[RobAC]

Actually this is something I've noticed as well. All version of IE instantly recognize me and automatically log me in. Netscape does not. However, all of a sudden, for whatever reason, Netscape just stared recognizing me a few days ago.

[s.molinari]

Just a question. I was also interested in this problem a while back and noticed strange URLs being created. Namely, the session variable was being added to the end of the URL allthough the "Browse board with cookies" was turned on. Can anybody replicate this?


Scott

[Mike Sullivan]

That happens automatically if the board determines you have a "bad cookie"


if ($s and $cookiehash and $s!=$cookiehash) {
$badcookie=1;
}

[s.molinari]

So this problem arrives due to improper cookie sending/recieving.

Now the question is, what in vB, the server, or the browser could cause improper sending/ recieving of cookies? Or what relationships between these components could cause this problem.

Is it a vB problem? I would venture to say no, because not all boards are having this problem, only a very small portion.

Is it a server problem? Maybe. But then, why aren't all the users having the same problem?

Is it a browser problem? Possibly, but again there should be some sort of relation between all the users using the same browser. Is there a relation?

Suggestion: Those who have the problem tell their users who have problems to report which browser their using. Maybe that will shed some light.

Scott

[TheFiringLine.com]

Are those of you with problems running multiple copies of VB on the same domain? I installed 2.0.0 in a test directory and it raised absolute hell with my cookies.

Specifically, I couldn't log on to the v1.# forums....couldn't even get into the Control Panel. I solved it per the instructions in the option: "Path to Cookies".
Rich