Question

I have created a chat system using php and ajax. When a user logs into this chat system, in table is_online field status is updated to 1. I am using this field to list current online members.

I have to update status to 0 if the user closes all the tabs of my website without pressing logout.

How can I do it?

Answer 1

Really bad method.

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Make a table online_users with fields name and timeout.
Store user’s name (or ID, or any other identification) and current timestamp + 5 minutes (or different threshold, you decide).

When displaying online users, select all users from that table where timeout is BIGGER than current timestamp.
Example:

$time = time();
$result = mysql_query("SELECT `name` FROM `online_users` WHERE `timeout` > '$time'");

And set up a CRON that will clean the table once a day.

And don’t forget to update timeout.