Why Does My User Name Disappear

I (TomStambaugh) have repeatedly (over the last few years) signed up for and received a username that works when I first sign up, and that stops working soon thereafter. Yes, of course my IP address changes from time to time, but Wiki uses a cookie mechanism so that that shouldn't matter.

Is this something funky on my side, or is there a problem lurking here somewhere?

Do you sometimes disable cookies? If so, that could account for the effect you describe.

Nope, I switch from browser to browser (Explorer, Netscape, Mozilla) but that should have no effect.

Of course, if you set the UserName cookie in browser A, and then later edit a page from browser B, browser B probably won't be aware of the cookie (but some browsers will copy cookies from other browsers on installation).

Do you 'lose' your username from each browser independently, having set it up in each browser at about the same time?

I set up the UserName in Netscape (v4.76) and everything works fine. I use Explorer and Mozilla (although I don't think I visit Wiki with them, but I'm not sure of that). I come back, later, to Wiki in Netscape again -- and my UserName has stopped working.

I've noticed that Mozilla 1.0/1.1 and Netscape 7.0 walk on each other's profiles. They "share" (meaning each writes over the other)

 //WINDOWS/Application Data/Mozilla/Profiles/

Unfortunately, this apparently includes cookies.txt, kept in a subdir of Profiles/default/. It would also appear that different profiles collect different cookies, leading to further opportunities for confusion - especially since Mozilla and Netscape argue (at browser launch) over which owns "default". A note above indicates that the UserName mechanism doesn't work under Mozilla. Is it possible that it not only doesn't work, but that it also breaks subsequent Netscape UserName accesses? -- TomStambaugh

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MozillaFirefox users, see the UserName page.

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CategoryWikiMaintenance