Posted by Ben Holt on 09/14/05 19:16

bruce wrote:

>ben...
>
>i understand what you've stated, but i was under the impression that a
>number of sites (etrade, etc...) can/do track who is/is not logged into
>their sites.. and not just by some crude 'timeout' function...
>
>
Yes they do, the key there being that they are tracking who is logged
into their site. You log in, they make a note of it, you log out, they
make a note of it. If you don't log out and yet are inactive for a
period of time your login becomes stale and you are logged out
automatically by the timeout.



>i might be wrong, but it was my understanding that those kinds of sites have
>the ability to more or less know when someone kills the browser session, and
>is no longer on the system. these kinds of sites also ustilize some form of
>a 'timeout' process as well for users who simply have browser sessions that
>are inactive...
>
>by your statements, you're pretty much saying that the only approach one has
>to this issue is to utilize some sort of timeout function, and if you don't
>detect user activity after your timeout, then mark the user as no longer
>being active, and proceed accordingly. this apporach doesn't allow an app to
>immediately know when a user has killed the browser.
>
>so, the question might be, how does one detect when a user has killed a
>session/left your app?
>
>

Provide a login/logout ability and when they log out you kill their
session. This is how an e-trade like site would deal with it. If they
don't log out you still won't know they have left your site until their
session times out though.

Some reading on HTTP would help you understand why what you are looking
for is not possible.

- Ben

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