This is a really wierd one. I have come across an issue where issuing a chop command in a subrotine called before I set a cookie using CGI.pm prevents that cookie from being set.

Yeah, I know. It sounds totally strange. But it's the only explanation I can find, and replacing my chop with a simple substr eliminates the problem!

There are no errors with that statement in the error logs, and execution of the script continues unabated, so I know that's not the problem. Has anyone else run into this? What could this be due to?

Here's a bit of code:
if (($user)&&($passcheck)) {
        # create a MD5 hash for session management

        my $session_brand = md5_hex(rand());
        (my $session_timestamp, my $session_expiration) = get_timestam
+p();
        my $session_done = set_session($session_brand,$session_timesta
+mp, $session_expiration);
       
        my $cookie = cookie(-domain=>"$meta_configs{xina_domain}",
                            -name=>"$meta_configs{login_cookie_name}",
                            -value=>"$session_brand",
                            -path=>"$meta_configs{login_cookie_path}",
                            -expires=>"$meta_configs{login_cookie_expi
+ration}");

        print $q->header(-cookie=>[$cookie]); # cookie set

[download]
The culprit subroutine was get_timestamp() - here it is: 
sub get_timestamp {

    (my $year, my $month, my $day, my $hour, my $min, my $sec) = Today
+_and_Now();

    my $now_ts = "$year-$month-$day $hour:$min:$sec";

    my$Dd; my $Dh; my $Dm;

     # cookie expiration is always in the form 10m or 1d
    my $time_frame = chop($meta_configs{login_cookie_expiration});
    if (($meta_configs{login_cookie_expiration} =~ /[0-9]+/)&&($time_f
+rame eq "m"))
        {$Dm = $meta_configs{login_cookie_expiration};}
    elsif (($meta_configs{login_cookie_expiration} =~ /[0-9]+/)&&($tim
+e_frame eq "h"))
        {$Dh = $meta_configs{login_cookie_expiration};}
    elsif (($meta_configs{login_cookie_expiration} =~ /[0-9]+/)&&($tim
+e_frame eq "d"))
        {$Dd = $meta_configs{login_cookie_expiration};}
    else {$Dh = 1;} # make a default expiration of 1 hour

    (my $nyr, my $nmo, my $nday, my $nhr, my $nmin, my $nsec) = Add_De
+lta_DHMS($year, $month, $day, $hour, $min, $sec,$Dd, $Dh, $Dm, 0);

    my $expiration = "$nyr-$nmo-$nday $nhr:$nmin:$nsec";

    return ($now_ts, $expiration);
}

[download]
The culprit line is:  my $time_frame = chop($meta_configs{login_cookie_expiration});
If I replace that with: my $time_frame = substr ($meta_configs{login_cookie_expiration},-1,1); Everything works fine!

Thanks for any ideas. I'm not stuck, I obvioulsy solved the problem, but it seems strange, and I'd love to find out what the issue really is.

In reply to chop and CGI.pm cookie problem? by michellem

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