Session variables across multiple pages

[John H]

Hi,

I'm busy fiddling with sessions under PHP5, and very quickly learned
what I would have found out even sooner in the PHP manual - declaring
your session variable on page1.php makes it available on page2.php
(assuming that's the next page you load) but doesn't then make it
available on page3.php unless you respecify it on page2.php. I'm sure
there's a very good reason for it, and I know I can get around it by
using a database and the session ID, but I would really like to know:
why? I've already searched, but can't find any more information on the
issue.

Thanks,
John Heathcote

[Captain Paralytic]

On 26 Jul, 12:58, John H <[e-mail]:

Hi,

I'm busy fiddling with sessions under PHP5, and very quickly learned
what I would have found out even sooner in the PHP manual - declaring
your session variable on page1.php makes it available on page2.php
(assuming that's the next page you load) but doesn't then make it
available on page3.php unless you respecify it on page2.php. I'm sure
there's a very good reason for it, and I know I can get around it by
using a database and the session ID, but I would really like to know:
why? I've already searched, but can't find any more information on the
issue.

Thanks,
John Heathcote

You've got to be careful about your language when dealing with php and
other such languages, when considering web pages.

You have said: "declaring your session variable on page1.php".

Now do you mean "on the web page that is displaed as a result of
executing page1.php", or "in the script file page1.php".

This is important because there does not need to be a one-to-one
relationship between a .php file and a web page.

One php file may display zero, one or more than one web page.
Alternatively a web page may be made up of output from more than one
php script file.

[gosha bine]

On 26.07.2007 13:58 John H wrote:

Hi,

I'm busy fiddling with sessions under PHP5, and very quickly learned
what I would have found out even sooner in the PHP manual - declaring
your session variable on page1.php makes it available on page2.php
(assuming that's the next page you load) but doesn't then make it
available on page3.php unless you respecify it on page2.php.

This is not true. Once set, a "session variable" (more strictly, a key
in the $_SESSION array) is automatically available to all pages sharing
the same session.
--
gosha bine

makrell ~ http://www.tagarga.com/blok/makrell
php done right ;) http://code.google.com/p/pihipi

[Jerry Stuckle]

John H wrote:

Hi,

I'm busy fiddling with sessions under PHP5, and very quickly learned
what I would have found out even sooner in the PHP manual - declaring
your session variable on page1.php makes it available on page2.php
(assuming that's the next page you load) but doesn't then make it
available on page3.php unless you respecify it on page2.php. I'm sure
there's a very good reason for it, and I know I can get around it by
using a database and the session ID, but I would really like to know:
why? I've already searched, but can't find any more information on the
issue.

Thanks,
John Heathcote

It should be available on every page you load - as long as you call
session_start() at the beginning of the page.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
js*******@attglobal.net
==================

[John H]

On Jul 26, 3:26 pm, Jerry Stuckle <[e-mail]:

John H wrote:

Hi,

I'm busy fiddling with sessions under PHP5, and very quickly learned
what I would have found out even sooner in the PHP manual - declaring
your session variable on page1.php makes it available on page2.php
(assuming that's the next page you load) but doesn't then make it
available on page3.php unless you respecify it on page2.php. I'm sure
there's a very good reason for it, and I know I can get around it by
using a database and the session ID, but I would really like to know:
why? I've already searched, but can't find any more information on the
issue.

Thanks,
John Heathcote

It should be available on every page you load - as long as you call
session_start() at the beginning of the page.

Thanks to everyone for their help - I eventually found the problem on
my side with session_start() not being declared on a few of the pages
- I've now got a require() function on my template to put in the
appropriate headers, including session_start(). Also, thanks to
Captain Paralytic - I described the problem thus to simplify matters,
but yes, I was talking about a single html page at a time with php
script inside it. Your point, however, is well taken.