How to access php session files - php

Question

I have a Yii application with cookie based login enabled.
So , every time a user connects to the application a session file gets created on the server
(/var/lib/php5) related to the PHPSESSID.
One of the Session variables is the timeout (timestamp).
I want to create a php script which access all of these Session files , opens them , checks for the timeout , and if it is timed-out ,make some changes to a specific table in the database.
First problem , from within my php script I'cant open session files in /var/lib/php5.
Permission denied.(AFAIK from my php script I try to open those files as Apache User , though I need to be superuser , how could that be done...on the fly ? -without changing file permissions)
Second problem.
Even if I try from my php script to open the superglobal $_SESSION for a specific session id
I still get the permission denied message.
$sSessId='la05bdm63rdmjevg4hfrcf17u6';
session_id($sSessId);
session_start();
print_r($_SESSION);
Any suggestions on how a php script can access those session files ?
Many thnx in advance.

Answer 1

First you do not need to invoke session_start() because by default its true, to disable in the config/main.php
'session' => array (
'autoStart' => false,// by default is true
),
The best way to read session in Yii is by using the build in functions Yii::app()->session which is similar to the super global array $_SESSION.
Yii::app()->session['var'] = 'value';
echo Yii::app()->session['var'];
To unset a session variable
unset(Yii::app()->session['var']);
To remove a session variable
Yii::app()->session->remove('var')
to change the path to your session variable
'session' => array (
'sessionName' => 'Site Access',
'cookieMode' => 'only',
'savePath' => '/path/to/new/directory',
),
Hope this will help