Question

I can’t understand the strange behaviour of sessions in CakePHP controller:

class UsersController extends AppController
{
    public $helpers = array('Session');
    public $components = array('Session'); 

    public function Do() {
        $this->Session->write('Foo', 'Bar');
        $_SESSION['Foo2'] = 'Bar2';

        echo $this->Session->read('Foo');
        echo $_SESSION['Foo2'];
    }
};

First echo outputs nothing and the second one – Bar2. Why does native $_SESSION works but through CakePHP interface it’s not available?

Answer 1

(This answer assumes CakePHP 1.3)

You said in the comments that you have Session.save set to php on your config file. In the same file, you should have Session.start set to true. If you don’t, you have two options:

• Actually setting Session.start to true on the config file, or
• Calling $this->Session->activate() from the controller before using the Session component.

References:

http://book.cakephp.org/1.3/en/view/1465/Session (oddly, Session.start and activate() are only documented for the session helper, but they apply to the component too).
http://book.cakephp.org/1.3/view/931/CakePHP-Core-Configuration-Variables