Why doesn't cookie work in CodeIgniter?

Question

I use this function to add cookie and it adds perfectly as I can see in browser options.

function login($username,$password){

    $cookieUsername = array(
        'name'   => 'user',
        'value'  => md5($username),
        'expire' => time()+1000,
        'path'   => '/',
        'secure' => TRUE
    );

    $cookiePassword = array(
        'name'   => 'pass',
        'value'  => $password,
        'expire' => time()+1000,
        'path'   => '/',
        'secure' => TRUE
    );

    $this->input->set_cookie($cookieUsername);
    $this->input->set_cookie($cookiePassword);

}

I am unable to get back the cookie from this function:

 echo $this->input->cookie('user');

Please help - how can I get cookie back from CodeIgniter?

Christly

Please remember my server is localhost:8000 – Christly

You are saving hash of username. But not password! – Unburden

What is your CI version? – Unburden

yes i know shiplu! the problem is i am not getting cookie back. – Christly

Are set_cookie and cookie calls are in different http request? I mean browser after you call set-cookie you can not get it unless its sent to browser and browser makes the next request. – Unburden

ci version is 2.1.0 and i am using both functions on localhost:8000 – Christly

Look #16076333 – Inexact

Answer 1

Its problem with CI built in function which writes the cookie. What i changed is now i am setting cookie whith

setcookie($name,$value,$expire,$path); 

function and getting it back through

$this->input->cookie('user',TRUE); 

this is work damn fine!

Christly

I was having the same issue as OP and this recommendation fixed it on first attempt for me. Thanks Danny! – Mezzo

Answer 2

You can not get cookie on the same http request. Once you set a cookie it must be sent to browser by Set-Cookie header. And you can not send header until the http transaction is completed. After that browser will get the cookie and on the next request browser will send it to server by Cookie header.

From PHP.NET

Cookies will not become visible until the next loading of a page that the cookie should be visible for. To test if a cookie was successfully set, check for the cookie on a next loading page before the cookie expires. Expire time is set via the expire parameter.

So the cookie will be available on the next page load.

Unburden

NB: I did not have a problem getting the cookie on the same page load where the cookie was set using Chrome, but did have the problem with Safari. – Decennary

Did you check if your servers time is proper? – Unburden

Well, no, but it's local apache2 on my Mac so it's using the same time as the browser. However, it is not behaving that way... It does take a refresh of the page to show the cookie--even on Chrome. :) – Decennary

Its problem with CI built in function which writes the cookie. What i changed is now i am using setcookie($name,$value,$expire,$path); function and getting it back through $this->input->cookie('user',TRUE); this is work damn fine! – Christly

Answer 3

Switching to PHP's setcookie() instead of CI's $this->input->set_cookie() didn't work for me; the cookie was still not available until the next request. This makes sense because CI's method in fact generates a setcookie() so they're functionally equivalent. However, I was able to get it working right away by doing the following:

//this is the original code, which is made available next request:
$this->input->set_cookie('foo', 'bar', 86500);
//this is what I added, to make the cookie available immediately:
$_COOKIE['foo'] = 'bar';

Hope that helps someone.

Hazzard

Answer 4

I was having this problem and found that Codeigniter requires an expiry value, NOT just the name and value as stated in the documentation. I.e.

$cookie = array(
'name'  => 'logged',
'value'  => 1,
'expire' => '86500',
);

set_cookie($cookie);

Hedger

and expire should be an integer. – Proctor

Answer 5

Check your config.php cookie settings. If they are set wrong, cookies won't work. The defaults work for me locally using your code

$config['cookie_prefix']    = '';
$config['cookie_domain']    = '';
$config['cookie_path']      = '/';

also, you should encrypt the password if you're going to encrypt anything. And you shouldn't use md5. Use CI's built in encryption ($this->encrypt->encode();) which uses a safer algorithm [don't forget to set your encryption key in config.php].

Decennary

Answer 6

Check your config.php for cookie_secure directive. It must be FALSE for non-https domains.

If domain is not https and cookie_secure is set TRUE in config.php, cookies simply will not be set. Change to FALSE and it will be set in both http and https.

Lacee

Answer 7

That is caused by an incorrect initialization of function set_cookie() about $expire parameter, setted to empty string by default but it must be setted to 0 by default because it rapresent timestamp. Look at there correction

Line 342 on system/core/Input.php

https://github.com/diegomariani/CodeIgniter/commit/64ac9e711100605f41a3b37bc897a12063fed70b

Epagoge

Answer 8

public function cookie()
{
    $this->load->helper('cookie');

    $name   = 'user';
    $value  = 'pradip';
    $expire = time()+1000;
    $path  = '/';
    $secure = TRUE;

    setcookie($name,$value,$expire,$path); 

    $this->load->view('welcome_message');

}

call in view page like echo $this->input->cookie('user');

output = pradip

Bradshaw

Answer 9

Codeigniter, in its code, already adds time() for expiry, so you don't need to add time() in your cookie config.

Change:

 'expire' => time()+1000

To:

'expire' => 1000

Also use the procedural style cookie helper functions such as (set_cookie, get_cookie, delete_cookie..) as they automatically adds the cookie prefix config, while with the OOP ones ($this->input->set_cookie etc.), you will have to manually type in the cookie prefix config as well each time.

Demicanton

Answer 10

there is a bug in codeigniter: it doesn't use your cookie_prefix when reading the cookie (when writing the cookie, it does) see /system/core/Input.php in function cookie

Intercalate

Answer 11

First make sure you are including cookie helper:

$this->load->helper('cookie');

And set cookie like this:

set_cookie($cookie_name, $value, $time);

Merill

Answer 12

There is nothing wrong with Cookies in codeigniter it is working perfectly as expected,

the problem is in your syntax, the expiry date you have set in expire is incorrect.

because codeigniter add your provided value to current time, so if you want to set 30 days expiration from now on then you have to only provide value like 86400*30 in expire

then it will work ok for example: 'expire'=> 86400 * 30

when You provide value like time()+1000 it add that much value in time() so it becomes double of current time and browser count it as incorrect value,

And when you have an incorrect expire value, it defaults to 0, which is set as your session's length instead,

and because of that when your session expire means browser closes or window closes, cookies are also reset because session expires.

so the right example is as below:

$cookie = array(
   'name'   => 'user',
   'value'  => md5($username),
   'expire' => 86400*30,
   'secure' => TRUE
);
set_cookie($cookie);

Or another way is:

set_cookie('user',md5($username),86400*30);
//syntax
//set_cookie($name[, $value = ''[, $expire = ''[, $domain = ''[, $path = '/'[, $prefix = ''[, $secure = NULL[, $httponly = NULL]]]]]]])
       

Proctor

Answer 13

I had the same problem on localhost when I added

$config['cookie_domain']    = 'http://localhost:8888/mywebsite/';

After I inspected Application tab under Developer Tools in Chrome it showed that all cookies from all websites on localhost are stored under http://localhost:8888. You cannot add a specific local website into $config['cookie_domain'] while working on localhost. You can use this config only for a real domain name www.mywebsite.com on your public server. On localhost leave this config empty.

Stacystadholder