after login, checkout does not work (and it used to)

[gaoshan]

Hello! After logging in under a user account at my store (it's a new store) if I add anythign to my shopping cart and then click checkout (or even if I click Account) I am sent directly to the login page. If I then login, I can see the items in my shopping cart but trying to checkout again will drop me back to the login screen. Help!
Previously, I was able to make test purchases without any problem. Suddenly, on the day I walk my client through the store, neither he nor I can make purchases. I am pretty bothered by this. I also cannot find any reference to this in the forums. Any ideas?

-ST

[red_fraggle]

Are you on a *IX server? have you symlinked the http and https folders together? I get this behavior sometimes on shops that are using file session storage and not having properly symlinked directories.

What is happening is your losing session storage. Also make sure the "Force cookies" is on in admin. Yes you might lose a customer or two by forcing cookies, but its worth it in the long run from a security standpoint.



Red_Fraggle

[gaoshan]

Yes. I am using a unix server for this install. It's a commercially hosted server and the client is using a very inexpensive (i.e. very little administrative control for me) plan so I cannot create symlinks. However, I did set force cookies and that solved it. Thanks for the response!

-ST

[fridgemags]

I am having the same problem, After logging in and clicking checkout the shopping cart says it is empty. I have cookies set to be forced but no luck.

You can check this out by going to www.fridgemags.com and trying to check out, It will empty your shopping cart as if nothing is in it.

Any Ideas. This is obviously a huge problem cause customers cannot order anything.

Thanx

[gaoshan]

You know, I did do one other thing besides set force cookies. I had this trouble after I enabled a few things like shipping modules and payment modules. I disabled all of the midules I had set up and things worked fine. I suspect the problem may have been with either having the paypal payment module active and not having a paypal account or with having the USPS shipping module active and not having a USPS account.

[fridgemags]

If you are using a shared ssl Such as "https://yourhost.yourdomain.com" you cannot use cookies and must use session ids instead.

As soon as I turned force cookies off my cart worked fine and was secure.

Hope this helps