HTTP cookie "CAD" ?

phsythax · 12-18-2007, 02:54 AM

I am aware that http isn't exactly a programming language, but i don't know where else to ask, so admins are welcome to move this thread to wherever they think it belongs.

The thing is, i am in the middle of making a http client, and i've come as far as authenticating and getting the cookie from the server. But after that, Wireshark sends a (for me) unknown string before the real cookie to the server:

Cookie: CAD=1359454%231197828980%230%230%23%230; T3E=%3D%3DwN0czN6ITM3AzM4cT....... (cut)

What is this CAD-thing? Does it have anything to do with the expire date of the cookie? How do i generate this?

I hope for serious answers.
Thanks in advance!

- phsythax

osor · 12-18-2007, 12:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by phsythax

Cookie: CAD=1359454%231197828980%230%230%23%230; T3E=%3D%3DwN0czN6ITM3AzM4cT....... (cute)

What is this CAD-thing? Does it have anything to do with the expire date of the cookie? How do i generate this?

Umm… that’s part of the cookie. Cookies come as attribute-value pairs, where you have something like this initially sent by the server:

Code:

Set-Cookie: foo=bar

And the client (i.e., browser) must respond with this:

Code:

Cookie: foo=bar

in every subsequent request.

As for expiry and sessions, you can (on the server side) do things like this:

Code:

Set-Cookie: foo=bar; expires=date; path=/; domain=baz.org; secure

Date is in RFC-822 format (“Wdy, DD-Mon-YYYY HH:MM:SS GMT”), path is the path for which the cookie response is requested, and domain is the domain for which the cookie is desired. Secure means that the cookie should be transmitted back only through secure (i.e., https) communication.

You should read the relevant standards before trying to come up with a compliant client.