Patrick J. Kidd - Cookies -

Cookies

Web Programming Topics...
Turn on Cookies
- Tools (menu) > Internet Options > Privacy (tab) > Advanced (button) >
Times You Should Never “Accept Cookies” on a Site
View cookies
- Firefox: Cookies are all stored in the “cookies.sqlite” file - (Just search for this file.)
- Firefox: Tools (menu) | Options | Privacy (tab) | remove individual cookies
- Chrome: chrome://settings/cookies
- Chrome: Settings (menu) | Show advanced settings… | Settings | Content settings… | All cookies and site data
- 4 Ways to View Cookies - wikiHow
Cookie Facts:

always includes the address of the server that sent it
Stored on your computer
NN doesn't write to cookie until you exit NN

First-party cookies vs. Second-party cookies

You should accept all cookies for the site you are visiting (first-party cookies).
You should deny all cookies for second-party or third-party cookies (like doubleclick.com)
Accepting third-party cookies gives the website the right to sell your browsing behaviour to a data broker. The broker then combines your behaviour on one website with information from other websites and builds an extremely detailed profile of you as a consumer. "The broker then sells that profile to other third parties who want to market to people like you,"

Cookie Misconceptions:

True: Cookies cannot get user's e-mail address
True: Cookies cannot check out the contents of user's hard disk
True: Cookies cannot transmit viruses
True: Cookies cannot identify the individual user

e-Marketing

cookies are not malware (spyware, viruses, worms, Trojan Horses or other destructive software)
cookies are not an invasion of users' privacy
cookies should not be blocked or deleted - Most cookies are benign
- Because many users fear cookies, merchants should use more than one type of tracking technology
cookies are used to store information such as Website passwords, viewing preferences, click-through identification

CNET.com - Downloads
Dummies
- Defining and Dealing with Web Cookies - dummies
  - First-party cookies: You can choose to accept, block, or be prompted to choose, although this option gets tiresome very quickly if you encounter a lot of cookies. Some sites can store three or more cookies per page.
  - Third-party cookies: Just say no to (that is, choose Block) third-party cookies.
  - Always allow session cookies: This option lets all session cookies through, a type of cookie used to track a single instance of your visit to a Web site. These cookies are commonly used by shopping sites such as Amazon.com, and are harmless.
Facebook - Cookies, Pixels & Similar Technologies | Facebook Help Center | Facebook
HTML Goodies

JSPro.com
Microsoft
Surfer Beware III
Webmonkey: reference: Webmonkey Cookie Library
Times You Should Never "Accept Cookies" on a Site
Cookie values may not include semicolons, commas, or whitespace. For this reason, you may want to use the JavaScript escape() function to encode the value before storing it in the cookie. If you do this, you will have to use the corresponding unescape() function when you read the cookie value.
Web browsers are not required to retain more than 300 cookies total, nor more than 20 cookies per Web server (domain), nor to retain more than 4 KB of data per cookie.
Cookies are domain-specific - if one domain creates a cookie, another domain cannot access it.
Cookies are transferred to disk only when the user quits the browser. While your read, write, and delete cookies during a browser session, all activity is performed in memory.
Omitting the expiration date signals to the browser that this cookie is temporary. The browser never writes it to the cookie file.
One Possibility: Simply set the attributes for the cookie.txt file to read only and hidden and be done with it. Some browsers will keep cookies in memory but won't save them to disk when the program is closed. If there's some cookie that you actually do want then simply unprotect the file, start up the browser, visit the site and do what you need to do to set the cookie (say for auto-login purposes), close the browser, and then reprotect the file.
Use SSL connections to secure your credit card info. Use a special, dedicated mail account (e.g. WebMail) for transactions, not you personal home account. Remember that your credit card is safer traveling over the 'Net than it is traveling with your waiter at lunch.

Montreal Gazette 1999-04-10 "Web Q&A" by Mark Stachiew
A cookie is a small piece of information sent by a Web server to store on a Web browser so it can later be read back from that browser. This is how the server knows whether you have visited before. They are usually used to control the display the ads or personalized features.
Some people are paranoid that cookies are extracting all sorts of personal information from their machines, which isn't the case.
If your browser is currently configured to alert you whenever it detects a cookie, then you'll go crazy with all the alert boxes. The easiest way to get rid of these is to reconfigure your browser to accept cookies.
In Netscape, go the the toolbar Edit button, then pick Preferences, then Advanced and change the settings.
With Internet Explorer, click on the View button, then choose Internet Options, then the Advanced tab. under Security go to the "Cookies" options to make changes.
If you are determined to get rid of cookies and don't want to deal with annoying popup boxes all the time, then you''ll need some special software.

var expireDate = new Date
expireDate.setYear(expireDate.getYear()+1)
expireDate.toGMTString()
function setCookie(name,value) {
    expireString=";expires=" +expireDate
    pathString=";path=/"                     // so that all documents served from the same directory can share the cookie date
    document.cookie = name+ "=" +escape(value) +expireString +pathString)
}
Simple Cookies
- cookieName1=property:value;cookieName2=property:value;cookieName3=property:value
- setCookie("userName",document.myForm.nameField.value)
- function getCookie(name) {
      var result = null;
      var myCookie = document.cookie + ";";
      var searchName = name + "="'
      var startOfCookie = myCookie.indexOf(searchName);
      var endOfCookie;
      if (startOfCookie != -1) {
          startOfCookie += searchName.length;        // skip past cookie name
          endOfCookie = myCookie.indexOf(";", startOfCookie, endOfCookie));
      }
      return result;
  }
MultipleCookies
- cookieName1="property:value&property:value&property:value&property:value&property:value"
  cookieName2="property:value&property:value&property:value&property:value&property:value"
  cookieName3="property:value&property:value&property:value&property:value&property:value"
  setCookie("cookieName1",cookieName1); setCookie("cookieName2",cookieName2); setCookie("cookieName3",cookieName3);
  document.cookie will now include the values for all three of these cookies.
- You can use any separator characters you like. But...You must use them consistently.
  = (equals sign) is used to separate the cookie's name from the cookie's value (which can include many subcookies)
  : (colon) is used to separate the property name from the value of the subcookie
  ; (semicolon) is used to separate the cookies from each other
  & (ampersand) is used to separate the subcookies from each other.
- These 'subcookies' will have to be split into their component parts.