Cookie Support, and Mobile Devices

Yup, cookie support is pretty much inconsistent in mobile browsers; particularly in ones that aren't a direct port of an already-debugged and conformance tested desktop browser - that is, aren't a direct port of them but, instead, have been developed from scratch (for example, NetFront).

I've run into some very similar problems ranging from summer time problems (see for example my related article at http://forums.thoughtsmedia.com/f322/nasty-dst-related-bug-all-netfront-ppc-versions-71978.html ) with NetFront. With Thunderhawk, there is a problem of permanently storing cookes in the file system.

With Opera Mobile 8.65 (of which I was a closed betatester) I've found a very similar problem to the one you've described (this was fixed upon I've reported this to the Opera folks; however, the problem may still be present in Opera Mini or the desktop Opera; haven't tested this): that is, the problem of the (sub)hosts.

Thanks for the information Werner, it certainly makes for some interesting reading!

Its amazing how beneficial standards are when it comes to things like this. We really do take them for granted, so when a problem occurs that appears to be outside of our normal area of experience, it really is very easy to get stumped in the early stages :)

Daniel Hunt
dotMobi

I've noticed a problem recently with Vodafone customers in the UK 'losing' their cookies (and subsequently session) when browsing a mobile site.
The cookies seemed to get 'lost' when the customer's remote IP changed as they browsed the site - possibly due to some sort of load balancing on the WAP gateways.

I don't suppose anyone can shed some light on this?
The workaround I've used is to rewrite the Session ID into the URL.

Darragh,

Does this have anything to do with the OpenWave transcoding proxy between the user and the website's server? If you rerun your tests while using the non-transcoding-proxy gateway, can you replicate this issue? I'd be willing to bet that the issue you're experiencing has to do with a transcoder between the 2 endpoints :)

Daniel Hunt
dotMobi

Hi darragh,

We are experiencing the same problem with O2 UK users that the header Cookie: JSESSIONID=.............. gets lost as the user is browsing the mobile site (and yes when the request IP is changed) This is not happening for all the devices but only for some devices

Do you have idea when the request IP changes? Is it only load or is there something else also?

Yeah those problems with cookies on the mobile phone are just annoying. The good thing is that nowadays the biggest part of phones can actually normally support cookies like your PC does. But the old ones don't support them at all. Thanks for the interesting thoughts mate. I have bookmarked your blog.

Sincerely,

Matt Jutson from mobile application development

Glad you found it interesting Matt. I've been pretty inconsistent with my blog postings though - I must do something about that soon :)

Well said Daniel.

This is the most common obstacle I've found earlier while developing mobile based web application development but I'm little bit dis-agree with Matt at the line which said by him But the old ones don't support them at all. We can upgrade software in old phones so that old phones can also support cookies.

Cookies are mostly supported, but third party cookies of the kind used in advertising are not universally supported.

My understanding from research a couple of years back on first-party cookies:

iOS and Android work fine
Blackberry depends on the user's settings, so is not very reliable
Windows Mobile had a limit of something like 20 cookies, and then additional ones pushed out the older ones from memory
* Feature phones generally didn't support cookies

For third-party cookies, the above is true, with the notable additional limitation that iOS devices default to blocking third-party cookies. So unless a user changes the default (unlikely), these cookies will not work on iPhones, iPads, etc.

It's true that some operators disable or block cookies using the gateway and that is certainly a BAD practice that they should learn to avoid.

It is also true that US operators are rather on the edge of standards in many cases and don't comply with the requirements of OMA and GSM because either they don't care or simply because they are not using a GSM network.

While I can't say that you are wrong, I still think that Cookies are a good solution. I think that in most markets, for devices that support XHTML or WAP 2, Cookies are supposed to work and developers can create simple "honeypots" to check the support and then decide. This is also the reason why I showed the example of URL
torrents decoration.
A good honeypot might be to send a Cookie and also create links with URL decoration, in subsequent hits you can match the Cookie with the parameter you passed and decide what to do.

If you don't like what operators do with gateways you might suggest to your users to configure their mobile device to use an "internet APN" instead of the "WAP APN", when possible. This would be a good way to let operators understand that keeping things closed is not what users want.

A good honeypot might be to send a Cookie and also create links with URL decoration, in subsequent hits you can match the Cookie with the parameter you passed and decide what to do.

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A good honeypot might be to send a Cookie and also create links with URL decoration, in subsequent hits you can match the Cookie with the parameter you passed and decide what to do.A good honeypot might be to send a Cookie and also create links with URL decoration, in subsequent hits you can match the Cookie with the parameter you passed and decide what to do.

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This is the most common obstacle I've found earlier while developing mobile based web application development but I'm little bit dis-agree with Matt at the line which said by him But the old ones don't support them at all. We can upgrade software to reverse phone lookup so that old phones can also support cookies.

interesting article, there are sometimes problems with cookies.
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Cookies problem on the mobile phone are just annoying...
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I personally did not encounter any cookie issues on my own cell phone, however it needs more test for cell phone tracker apps and cell phone lookup services.

Thanks for the interesting thoughts mate.Lawyer

good content, keep posting articles like this one
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I'm using the iphone and the most recent update killed my cookies.

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I honestly never thought of cookies being an issue on cell phones until reading this article. Interesting. Reverse Phone Lookup

The Cookie Monster doesn't care about privacy concerns. See this cell phone lookup for example.

Hi! Thanks for sharing this, It is a good help for other people like me. Keep up with your good work, thanks! A good honeypot might be to send a Cookie and also create links with URL decoration, in subsequent hits you can match the Cookie with the parameter you passed and decide what to do. cash advance loans

I agree with you and believe it is reliable advice that cookies are recognized in current mobile web browsers. Definitely all mobile phones and latest feature devices will certainly support cookies. phone number lookup

How that can be effective? If I clear cookie is it possible to restore? scrabble cheat

It' s true cookies are very annoying, not only on the mobile phone, but also on the pc. The good part is that here you have the option of deleting cookies easy. Cheers. Online math tutor