Periodic automatic logout in new software?
 

Does the new FT software automatically log out a user after a specified number of days/weeks? I've noticed that I occasionally have to re log-in.

It's hard for me to tell how often this happens because I read FT on about 4-5 machines some of which have 2-3 web browers in 2 OS's, but it's definately happened more than once. I'm not clearing cookies or anything, so that's not causing it. No funny firewalls either. My laptops do change IP address regularly, but I don't see how that could be an issue, and the logout doesn't happen nearly as often as my laptop moves around.

With the old software, I never remember having to re-log-in.

As long as you have the "Remember Me?" box checked when you login, your login cookie should stay indefinitely (as far as I know). I haven't noticed a similar problem myself using different browsers on our PCs and Macs, both here and at home. When I've logged in, my browsers have all remembered me...

There is a session cookie, which keeps track of the last time you accessed the board (and shows which posts are new, etc.) which expires after 30 minutes of non-activity, but this shouldn't affect your login.

I Experience Frequent Log-Outs Also
 

My log-ins expire quickly (after about 3 hours or less), and it's a definite un-enhancement. It started a few days ago, and I'm not aware of any changes to my browser settings in months.

It does not happen at another board that I frequent, which makes me think it's a change implemented at FT.

I verified with John that we haven't changed anything. Again, I can't duplicate this error, even on the machines that I haven't accessed FT from since Friday. I just went over to one, went to the forums front page and I was still logged in.

While I have never experienced this problem at FlyerTalk before...I have experienced problems with cookies on other sites in the past.

Provided that no changes in the software to FlyerTalk were made...there were probably security setting changes within Windows (I'm assuming).

The thing is that you do not need to actually change them for them to change. (What were they thinking?) If you use Automatic Updates in Windows - or if you have downloaded Windows Update files from windowsupdate.microsoft.com ... there is a decent chance that your security settings have been changed.

There are many different updates that could change your security settings...but most notably are "security" updates or "internet explorer" updates (or upgrades!).

To change your Internet Explorer security settings, go to Tools -> Internet Options. Alternately, you can go to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Internet Options.

The problems you are experiencing could be caused by settings related to cookies.

Just a thought! Be warned that changing the wrong settings could allow someone bad :td: to harm your computer.

@:-)
We may have a lead on the logging out problem; we're trying something with the cookies to test it. Because of that, your current login cookie may expire and you may need to login again one more time, but we're hoping that'll be it.

Success!
 

Whatever you did, it seems to have worked. Thank you.

Then you're not going to be happy, as we have to revert the change. :(

The problem stems from us running the web servers on multiple machines, to cope with traffic. The cookies get split between the machines and sometimes they don't read correctly (and you get logged out).

We set the cookies differently yesterday, which solved the not remaining logged in problem, but caused a different problem. Now, users are having difficulty logging out because of that (they logout one one server, but not another, etc). We're reverting the cookies back so that people can log out (when viewing FT on a public computer/kiosk/etc) and actually be logged out, to prevent compromising their account info.

Sorry for the problems with all of this. Hopefully we'll get this smoothed out.

Gloom, despair and agony on me. :(

Oh, well, I'll just have to keep logging in.

I experienced a similar problem when the new FT was launched, only I couldn't even stay logged in long enough to post a message. I finally tried clearing all cookies from my computer. (I run IE 6/ Win ME). I then changed the privacy settings to override automatic cookie handling. I chose to prompt for all first- and third- party cookies. The next time I accessed FT, I accepted all FT cookies when prompted. I have remained logged in ever since.

I am not very computer savvy so I have no idea if changing the privacy settings actually helped or if it was only coincidence but I thought I'd mention it .... just in case it's a repeatable solution.

Good luck.

Happened to me again today in my laptop (mozilla/linux).

What's so weird for me is that it's so rare and spaced out. It seems to be striking others more often.

It does help, definitely. ^ Allowing FlyerTalk to store and read cookies unhampered on your system is a common fix for a lot of these types of errors.