PHP Cook-ies Max-Age WRONG!?
 

PHP's setcookie function seems to be wrong....

It used to be that you'd set cookies based on a GMT general date
format. However this wasn't affective as there is no way you can
set a client to expire based on the server time as there is little
chance of them being the same.

So the standard was changed to "Max-Age" being "Seconds till
expire". However the PHP manual states that it's "Seconds since
Epoch (1/1/1970)". Which still creates the client/server conflict in
time settings.

Is the PHP manual wrong?
or
Is PHP wrong?
or
Is does it work as it should?
Meaning you just set the number of seconds to expiry.

-Ben

try time()+$secs

From what I can figure out the PHP manual is flat-out wrong.

There are a crapload of people coming up with all kinds of stupid
methods to work around the "problem" when the only real
problem is the manual is wrong.

-Ben

try time()+$secs is wrong.

time() is on the server. The cookie is expiring on the client.

How can you set the expiry based on Epoch if the server and
client time are not exactly the same.... You can't... Thus they
changed the specifications and instead of using "Expires" (GMT
general date) they now use "Max-Age" (seconds TILL EXPIRY)....
Whereas the manual states it is "seconds since Epoch" which is
wrong.

There are crap-loads of ppl writting all sorts of stupid functions to
properly handle this when the only real problem is the manual
has false information.

It seems this false information is so well spread that netscape
even accounts for it and will use either the correct or incorrect
method for expiry time by checking the server time against that of
the client. However I believe this is the only browser which does
such. Man there must be a LOT of people out there with incorrect
cookie code.

-Ben

has always worked fine for me...

If you're setting a time well in the future you will not notice.

-Ben