New auto-logout? Anyone else?

[RavensFan]

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@altenbach wrote:

Just happened to me again. I was browsing the forum for at least 30 minutes when I suddenly found myself logged out.

Seemed completely random.

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I'm not seeing logouts as frequently as that.  Only over a long period of time (like overnight) if I haven't been active.

[LiliMcDonald]

Thank you, everyone, for the information. We are following up with Lithium and I will report back when I have an update.

Thanks,

[tst]

Like RF, I'm currently only seeing logouts overnight if I keep the session open and this seems much more frequent than it was before last week. Before it would happen, but not often, and now it seems to happen every day, which means when I open a new page I basically get the "you were logged out, do you want to log in again?" message.

[LiliMcDonald]

When you're asked to log in again, can you click on the sign in link and you're automatically logged in -- or do you have to enter in your email and password again?

[LiliMcDonald]

I wanted to restate what I briefly mentioned in my first post in hopes of narrowing down the issue here.

There has always been an auto log-off rule in place in which you would be logged out after 180 minutes of inactivity. Given this, it makes sense if you're logged out overnight if you've left your computer on and the browser open to the forums. However, if you're saying this overnight log-off is only occurring recently, perhaps this feature was never working properly until recently.

The above is a different scenario than experiencing random log-offs. If this is happening to you, it would be helpful to answer the following questions (if you haven't already):

- How much time passes between being logged in and realizing you have been logged out

- What are you doing when this happens? Are you just browsing or attempting to write a post?

- Do you see any error messages?

- When you log back in, do you have to enter your email and password, or are you logged in automatically?

- What web browser are you using?

- Have you tried clearing cookies/cache?

Hopefully this clarification helps identify the breadth of the random log-off issue.

[tst]

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@LiliMcDonald wrote:
When you're asked to log in again, can you click on the sign in link and you're automatically logged in -- or do you have to enter in your email and password again?

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Just click the link.

I remember hearing about the auto logout rule from earlier admins and was always quite happy that it doesn't actually work properly and for once Lithium's penchant for bugs produces a positive outcome. It's not a huge deal to be signed out and have to click to sign in (although I haven't thought of all the cases and I'm sure there are cases where there's some cached data that this logout will cause us to lose), but it's still more convenient not to have to do it. It would be nice if this value was user configurable.

[altenbach]

Yes, just clicking the log-in link is sufficient to get back in.

It is not only overnight. Even overnight, it is only after a handful of succesful page loads, never immediately. But I also had found me logged out twice now in the middle of a longer browser session. I am browsing, reading, and replying in the forum for 15-30 minutes and suddenly I am logged out, completely out of the blue as if it no longer detects activity and simply logs us out a fixed time after a login. 😞

So what is the logic behind a login expiration? While it makes sense on a public computer, it is just annoying on a personal computer, especially since we get back in with a single click and no further authentication. I would prefer a more permanent cookie. There should be no expiration. If it need to check in to see if the linked NI profile is still valid, it can do that behind the scenes.

I am logged into chrome on any of my devices and all passwords are stored globally. Even on a brand new computer, all passwords are pre-filled once I log into the browser. It only costs me an extra click, but there is no conceivable extra security by expiring forum session. It is just a stick thrown into the spokes occasionally. Pointless!

Similarly, we need a profile page that lists all current session with IP address, etc. and a way to remotely disconnect any of them. (similar to google). Also, similar to google, it could send an e-mail whenever a login occurs from an unknown new device.

[altenbach]

1.5 hours after posting the above and doing some other site work, It kicked me out again out of the blue.

I refreshed my profile page. There was one bold entry in my Kudoed posts (In the Proverb thread), so I clicked on it. (Obviously, I was logged in at that point in time, else everything would have been bold!), After that I clicked on the last page of the same thread to see the latest post that made the thread bold. My profile shows many more (30 instead of 10 posts per page), so the highest page number was #9, and that's what I clicked.

Bam! Logged out again!

As you can see, I landed on page #9, which is now NOT the last page in the default view. Here the pages suddenly go up to #25 because I am no longer logged in!

[LiliMcDonald]

Thanks for the details, Christian. This sounds pretty frustrating.  We're actively working with Lithium to figure out the cause of this issue.

We're also understanding of your complaints about the current login behavior, and we can begin to address this internally as well once we've resolved this issue.

I'll let you know if I have more questions or when I have an update.

Thanks,

[altenbach]

Just now it kicked me out in the middle of composing a reply.

After refreshing the page, I was logged in again and it gave me the option to load or discard an existing composition.