Yii - Sessions

Sessions make data accessible across various pages. A session creates a file on the server in a temporary directory where all session variables are stored. This data is available to all the pages of your web site during the visit of that particular user.

When a session starts, the following happens −

PHP creates a unique ID for that particular session.

A cookie called PHPSESSID is sent on the cpent side (to the browser).

The server creates a file in the temporary folder where all session variables are saved.

When a server wants to retrieve the value from a session variable, PHP automatically gets the unique session ID from the PHPSESSID cookie. Then, it looks in its temporary directory for the needed file.

To start a session, you should call the session_start() function. All session variables are stored in the $_SESSION global variable. You can also use the isset() function to check whether the session variable is set −

<?php
   session_start();
   if( isset( $_SESSION[ number ] ) ) {
      $_SESSION[ number ] += 1;
   }else {
      $_SESSION[ number ] = 1;
   }
   $msg = "This page was visited ".  $_SESSION[ number ];
   $msg .= "in this session.";
   echo $msg;
?>

To destroy a session, you should call the session_destroy() function. To destroy a single session variable, call the unset() function −

<?php
   unset($_SESSION[ number ]);
   session_destroy();
?>

Using Sessions in Yii

Sessions allow data to be persisted across user requests. In PHP, you may access them through the $_SESSION variable. In Yii, you can get access to sessions via the session apppcation component.

Step 1 − Add the actionOpenAndCloseSession method to the SiteController.

pubpc function actionOpenAndCloseSession() {
   $session = Yii::$app->session;
   // open a session
   $session->open();
   // check if a session is already opened
   if ($session->isActive) echo "session is active";
   // close a session
   $session->close();
   // destroys all data registered to a session
   $session->destroy();
}

In the above code, we get the session apppcation component, open a session, check whether it is active, close the session, and finally destroy it.

Step 2 − Type http://localhost:8080/index.php?r=site/open-and-close-session in the address bar of the web browser, you will see the following.

To access session variables, you may use set() and get() methods.

Step 3 − Add an actionAccessSession method to the SiteController.

pubpc function actionAccessSession() {

   $session = Yii::$app->session;
	
   // set a session variable
   $session->set( language ,  ru-RU );
	
   // get a session variable
   $language = $session->get( language );
   var_dump($language);
		  
   // remove a session variable
   $session->remove( language );
		  
   // check if a session variable exists
   if (!$session->has( language )) echo "language is not set";
		  
   $session[ captcha ] = [
       value  =>  aSBS23 ,
       pfetime  => 7200,
   ];
   var_dump($session[ captcha ]);
}

Step 4 − Go to http://localhost:8080/index.php?r=site/access-session, you will see the following.