CakePHP session sharing between two apps, on the same domain

Question

I am having two CakePHP application working on the same domain.

They are located at localhost:8080/wishlist and localhost:8080/lighthouse.

"Wishlist" and "lighthouse" are each separate CakePHP applications.

The login page is at localhost:8080/lighthouse, and I want the session generated by the lighthouse application to be used in the wishlist application.

The directory structure is

/htdocs
    /wishlist
        /app
        /config
        ....
    /lighthouse
        /app
        /config
        ....

I have edited the core.php file for each application. I am using the same session cookie name and the same security sale but I am not able to get the session on the wishlist application.

How can I share a session in between my two applications?

As a side note, your directory structure could be /htdocs/wishlist/config, /htdocs/lighthouse/config, /htdocs/cake, /htdocs/vendors. By convention, this would allow both applications to share the same cake installation and global vendors directory without any manual configuration, and it would respond to the same URLs. A common mistake is thinking that the app directories cannot be renamed, which isn't the case. :) — deizel

deizel deizel · Accepted Answer · 2010-06-08T13:01:30

Firstly, install Firefox, Firebug and Firecookie. This will add a 'Cookies' tab to Firebug making it simple to inspect your cookies.

Cookies consist of multiple parts: name, value, domain, path, expires, etc. You are most interested in the 'path' part of the cookie here I believe.

By default CakePHP will restrict the path of each cookie to the subdirectory of your app. For example, when you visit /wishlist, a cookie will be created but it will be restricted to the /wishlist subdirectory. When you then go to /lighthouse the previous cookie won't apply, so thinking that you have no cookie/session, a new one is created that is restricted to the /lighthouse subdirectory.

You need to change the path of created cookies to / so they persist across all subdirectories. This should be as easy as adding ini_set('session.cookie_path', '/'); to both application's app/config/bootstrap.php files.

CakePHP session sharing between two apps, on the same domain

2 Answers