1Simple::Cookie(3) User Contributed Perl Documentation Simple::Cookie(3)
2
6 CGI::Cookie - Interface to Netscape Cookies
7
9 use CGI::Simple::Standard qw(header);
10 use CGI::Simple::Cookie;
11 # Create new cookies and send them
13 $cookie1 = new CGI::Simple::Cookie( -name=>'ID', -value=>123456 );
14 $cookie2 = new CGI::Simple::Cookie( -name=>'preferences',
15 -value=>{ font => Helvetica,
16 size => 12 }
17 );
18 print header( -cookie=>[$cookie1,$cookie2] );
19 # fetch existing cookies
21 %cookies = fetch CGI::Simple::Cookie;
22 $id = $cookies{'ID'}->value;
23 # create cookies returned from an external source
25 %cookies = parse CGI::Simple::Cookie($ENV{COOKIE});
26
28 CGI::Simple::Cookie is an interface to Netscape (HTTP/1.1) cookies, an
29 innovation that allows Web servers to store persistent information on
30 the browser's side of the connection. Although CGI::Simple::Cookie is
31 intended to be used in conjunction with CGI::Simple.pm (and is in fact
32 used by it internally), you can use this module independently.
33 For full information on cookies see:
35 http://www.ics.uci.edu/pub/ietf/http/rfc2109.txt
37
39 CGI::Simple::Cookie is object oriented. Each cookie object has a name
40 and a value. The name is any scalar value. The value is any scalar or
41 array value (associative arrays are also allowed). Cookies also have
42 several optional attributes, including:
43 1. expiration date
45 The expiration date tells the browser how long to hang on to the
46 cookie. If the cookie specifies an expiration date in the future,
47 the browser will store the cookie information in a disk file and
48 return it to the server every time the user reconnects (until the
49 expiration date is reached). If the cookie species an expiration
50 date in the past, the browser will remove the cookie from the disk
51 file. If the expiration date is not specified, the cookie will
52 persist only until the user quits the browser.
53 2. domain
55 This is a partial or complete domain name for which the cookie is
56 valid. The browser will return the cookie to any host that matches
57 the partial domain name. For example, if you specify a domain name
58 of ".capricorn.com", then Netscape will return the cookie to Web
59 servers running on any of the machines "www.capricorn.com",
60 "ftp.capricorn.com", "feckless.capricorn.com", etc. Domain names
61 must contain at least two periods to prevent attempts to match on
62 top level domains like ".edu". If no domain is specified, then the
63 browser will only return the cookie to servers on the host the
64 cookie originated from.
65 3. path
67 If you provide a cookie path attribute, the browser will check it
68 against your script's URL before returning the cookie. For exam‐
69 ple, if you specify the path "/cgi-bin", then the cookie will be
70 returned to each of the scripts "/cgi-bin/tally.pl",
71 "/cgi-bin/order.pl", and "/cgi-bin/customer_service/complain.pl",
72 but not to the script "/cgi-private/site_admin.pl". By default,
73 the path is set to "/", so that all scripts at your site will
74 receive the cookie.
75 4. secure flag
77 If the "secure" attribute is set, the cookie will only be sent to
78 your script if the CGI request is occurring on a secure channel,
79 such as SSL.
80 Creating New Cookies
82 $c = new CGI::Simple::Cookie( -name => 'foo',
84 -value => 'bar',
85 -expires => '+3M',
86 -domain => '.capricorn.com',
87 -path => '/cgi-bin/database',
88 -secure => 1
89 );
90 Create cookies from scratch with the new method. The -name and -value
92 parameters are required. The name must be a scalar value. The value
93 can be a scalar, an array reference, or a hash reference. (At some
94 point in the future cookies will support one of the Perl object serial‐
95 ization protocols for full generality).
96 -expires accepts any of the relative or absolute date formats recog‐
98 nized by CGI::Simple.pm, for example "+3M" for three months in the
99 future. See CGI::Simple.pm's documentation for details.
100 -domain points to a domain name or to a fully qualified host name. If
102 not specified, the cookie will be returned only to the Web server that
103 created it.
104 -path points to a partial URL on the current server. The cookie will
106 be returned to all URLs beginning with the specified path. If not
107 specified, it defaults to '/', which returns the cookie to all pages at
108 your site.
109 -secure if set to a true value instructs the browser to return the
111 cookie only when a cryptographic protocol is in use.
112 Sending the Cookie to the Browser
114 Within a CGI script you can send a cookie to the browser by creating
116 one or more Set-Cookie: fields in the HTTP header. Here is a typical
117 sequence:
118 $c = new CGI::Simple::Cookie( -name => 'foo',
120 -value => ['bar','baz'],
121 -expires => '+3M'
122 );
123 print "Set-Cookie: $c\n";
125 print "Content-Type: text/html\n\n";
126 To send more than one cookie, create several Set-Cookie: fields.
128 Alternatively, you may concatenate the cookies together with "; " and
129 send them in one field.
130 If you are using CGI::Simple.pm, you send cookies by providing a
132 -cookie argument to the header() method:
133 print header( -cookie=>$c );
135 Mod_perl users can set cookies using the request object's header_out()
137 method:
138 $r->header_out('Set-Cookie',$c);
140 Internally, Cookie overloads the "" operator to call its as_string()
142 method when incorporated into the HTTP header. as_string() turns the
143 Cookie's internal representation into an RFC-compliant text representa‐
144 tion. You may call as_string() yourself if you prefer:
145 print "Set-Cookie: ",$c->as_string,"\n";
147 Recovering Previous Cookies
149 %cookies = fetch CGI::Simple::Cookie;
151 fetch returns an associative array consisting of all cookies returned
153 by the browser. The keys of the array are the cookie names. You can
154 iterate through the cookies this way:
155 %cookies = fetch CGI::Simple::Cookie;
157 foreach (keys %cookies) {
158 do_something($cookies{$_});
159 }
160 In a scalar context, fetch() returns a hash reference, which may be
162 more efficient if you are manipulating multiple cookies.
163 CGI::Simple.pm uses the URL escaping methods to save and restore
165 reserved characters in its cookies. If you are trying to retrieve a
166 cookie set by a foreign server, this escaping method may trip you up.
167 Use raw_fetch() instead, which has the same semantics as fetch(), but
168 performs no unescaping.
169 You may also retrieve cookies that were stored in some external form
171 using the parse() class method:
172 $COOKIES = `cat /usr/tmp/Cookie_stash`;
174 %cookies = parse CGI::Simple::Cookie($COOKIES);
175 Manipulating Cookies
177 Cookie objects have a series of accessor methods to get and set cookie
179 attributes. Each accessor has a similar syntax. Called without argu‐
180 ments, the accessor returns the current value of the attribute. Called
181 with an argument, the accessor changes the attribute and returns its
182 new value.
183 name()
185 Get or set the cookie's name. Example:
186 $name = $c->name;
188 $new_name = $c->name('fred');
189 value()
191 Get or set the cookie's value. Example:
192 $value = $c->value;
194 @new_value = $c->value(['a','b','c','d']);
195 value() is context sensitive. In a list context it will return the
197 current value of the cookie as an array. In a scalar context it
198 will return the first value of a multivalued cookie.
199 domain()
201 Get or set the cookie's domain.
202 path()
204 Get or set the cookie's path.
205 expires()
207 Get or set the cookie's expiration time.
208
210 Original version copyright 1997-1998, Lincoln D. Stein. All rights
211 reserved.
212 This verson copyright 2001, Dr James Freeman.
214 This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
216 under the same terms as Perl itself.
217 Address bug reports and comments to: jfreeman@tassie.net.au
219
221 This section intentionally left blank :-)
222
224 CGI::Carp, CGI::Simple
225perl v5.8.8 2004-11-22 Simple::Cookie(3)