hello, i have v2 latest it was hosted on different host vps which was fine but finally i moved the host and basically everything is the same, i moved the files and exported and imported the database then change in config.php but now when i work on the admin area it suddenly shows me again login to admin and again working for sometime then suddenly shows login again!? what i wounder is that is not timeout issue as sometimes it works fine and saves question by question but sometimes even after working perfectly last minute, click somwhere in the admin or for example saving a question, it shows me the login screen... it is annoying, any suggested solution please thanks

I bet it's a session lifetime problem, check your server configuration

Thank you LouisGac

I checked my phpinfo and here is the variable that has 'session' can you advise what to do next please

thank you

Directive Local Value Master Value
session.gc_maxlifetime 1440 1440
session.cache_expire 180 180
log_errors_max_len 1024 1024
max_execution_time 30 30
max_file_uploads 20 20
max_input_nesting_level 64 64
max_input_time 60 60
max_input_vars 1000 1000
max_execution_time 30 30
max_file_uploads 20 20
max_input_nesting_level 64 64
max_input_time 60 60
max_input_vars 1000 1000

It seems correct indeed. Could you please give us more info about your installation? OS, PHP version, MySQL version, session in file or in db, etc

Thank you. As stated before, this package was on another host VPS, and it was working just perfect... what I did is I 'moved' it to another VPS which is basically the same... Cent OS, mysql 5.5.52-cll, PHP Version 5.4.45 - sorry don't know about the session in file issue

what i did when moving, exactly this:
- copied all files from old to new host
- extracted and imported the mysql database
- changed the config file of limesurvey so to the new db info and db user info
nothing more... it worked ok, all surveys are working, i only noticed this issue while working on the admin backend sometimes just takes me directly to the login page... and sometimes (very less) when opening the survey from end user piont of view it takes few more seconds than usual and gives white page or messy layout... if click refresh it works and continue... but not always, this is happening (from survey taker side) like each 20-30 times only once

please advise what could be wrong or what i have to do next

thanks again

are you using ssl? ( https )

no, not at all.

Ok, so it's possible you have two web applications running on this server, one with a short session life time that delete all other sessions.
Try to enable database session, it should solve the problem.

LouisGac wrote: Ok, so it's possible you have two web applications running on this server, one with a short session life time that delete all other sessions.

Since a VPS is used, that could be easily checked. The user should be able to name all applications which are in use.

Since version/build and other parameters are unknown, I wouldn't recommend to switch to database sessions that quick.
That might bring new issues to town.

Check the session directory of php (which is mostly tmp) for the session files.
If the tmp directory gets cleaned by other scripts/apps you can change the session directory of php. If that issue still exist after changing the session directory you can focus on the php scripts running on your VPS.

Hello guys and thanks for your input.

1. how to change the session to db? i don't know how to do this, although, still somehow acceptable so i don't want to go this way unless necessary... still want to know how to do this please if there is tutorial or guide to follow

2. changing the tmp to different folder, do you mean only for limesurvey or for the whole sever?

now after my last reply the end user page while answering the survey, when moving from question to another, it lagges, it takes seconds and when shows next questions it shows it without header sometimes which spoils the layout.. seems something not wrong and happens occasionally...

itsme wrote: 2. changing the tmp to different folder, do you mean only for Limesurvey or for the whole sever?

I wrote that you might change the php session directory (when it is currently using /tmp). That implies a change for all php scripts that are using that php.ini where you change the directory. Since your VPS setup is unknown, there might be more than one php.ini. There are setups with more than one php interpreter installed.

itsme wrote: 1. how to change the session to db? i don't know how to do this, although, still somehow acceptable so i don't want to go this way unless necessary... still want to know how to do this please if there is tutorial or guide to follow

In application/config/config.php , there is lines you can uncomment, look for "table-based sessions"