PHP configuration to enable sessions

Question

Hi,

On our development server, sessions handling works fine. On our production server, it doesnt.

phpinfo on the development server shows:

                 session
Session Support                 enabled
Registered save handlers            files user mm sqlite
Registered serializer handlers  php php_binary wddx 

phpinfo on the production server shows:

                 session
Session Support                    enabled
Registered save handlers          files user
Registered serializer handlers  php php_binary wddx 

What is "mm sqlite" and could it be causing the problem? How do I enable this? What are these settings anyway?

---

The rest of the settings are common between the two:

Directive   Local Value Master Value
session.auto_start  Off Off
session.bug_compat_42   On  On
session.bug_compat_warn On  On
session.cache_expire    180 180
session.cache_limiter   nocache nocache
session.cookie_domain   no value    no value
session.cookie_httponly Off Off
session.cookie_lifetime 0   0
session.cookie_path /   /
session.cookie_secure   Off Off
session.entropy_file    no value    no value
session.entropy_length  0   0
session.gc_divisor  100 100
session.gc_maxlifetime  1440    1440
session.gc_probability  1   1
session.hash_bits_per_character 4   4
session.hash_function   0   0
session.name    PHPSESSID   PHPSESSID
session.referer_check   no value    no value
session.save_handler    files   files
session.save_path   /tmp    /tmp
session.serialize_handler   php php
session.use_cookies On  On
session.use_only_cookies    On  On
session.use_trans_sid   0   0

---

Can the absence of the "mm sqlite" stop PHP sessions from working when shifting from development to production?

Answer 1

Taken from http://devzone.zend.com/article/141

There are a couple built-in options for storing session data. The session handler is set in the php.ini under the directive named

session.save_handler

sqlite Optionally, you can store session data in an sqlite database. To do so, use a configuration such as:

session.save_handler = files
session.save_path = /tmp/phpsess.db

mm For high-performance session storage, you can store session data in memory with the mm shared-memory module. You'll need to compile php with the mm module support. Here is a tutorial to configure session handling with mm ( http://www.zend.com/tips/tips.php?id=164&single=1 ). Note that since session date is stored in RAM, you should consider it volatile data, and it's lost with power outage or a reboot.

Note: the link in the above tutorial is outdated. You can retrieve the mm module from the OSSP.org website.

Answer 2

What does the rest of the 'sessions' settings look like on your phpinfo page?

Particularly, what is the value of "session.save_handler" and "session.save_path"?

Here is some more information: http://php.net/manual/en/session.configuration.php

"mm" and "sqlite" are alternative save handlers available for you to use. By default, php uses "files" which will store session data on your local server.