Re: [Lynx-dev] Need to Store Cookies but Nothing Works.

[Brian Pardy]

Hello Martin,

On Tue, May 30, 2017 at 8:45 AM, Martin McCormick <address@hidden> wrote:

        After a web search using linux, lynx and cookies, I found
documentation on using lynx which advised to put the following
lines either in lynx.cfg or ~/.lynxrc:

ACCEPT_ALL_COOKIES:TRUE
     SET_COOKIES:TRUE
     PERSISTENT_COOKIES:TRUE
     COOKIE_FILE:.lynx_cookies

That last line shouldn't be necessary as all but the DOS version
of lynx are supposed to use ~/.lynx_cookies by default.

        A weather site started this quest when it began sending a
cookie every time one accesses it which now means an extra step
just to check conditions. I receive:

mobile.wunderground.com cookie: P=FAVS:1|WXSN:1|PWSOB Allow? (Y/N/Always/neVer)

        I type a and it works fine but nothing is stored so next
time I run it, it's the same drill again. I tried putting these
lines in ~/.lynxrc, ~/.lynx.cfg and both files. They might as
well be comments for the effect they had. 

        This is the version of lynx one gets if one adds lynx to
Debian jessie using apt-get. [...]

The lynx.cfg and .lynxrc files do not use the same syntax. The "ACCEPT_ALL_COOKIES:TRUE" syntax you've listed works for lynx.cfg (which Debian's release likely looks for in /etc/lynx.cfg or possibly /etc/lynx/lynx.cfg -- it should not search your home directory for the lynx.cfg file unless you have set the LYNX_CFG environment variable to tell it to do so), but that syntax does not work for ~/.lynxrc.  Please try with the following line in your ~/.lynxrc:

accept_all_cookies=on

Since you already receive a prompt to accept cookies, you shouldn't need to additionally set the set_cookies option, you already have cookie processing enabled. Debian probably also has persistent cookies enabled by default so you shouldn't need to set that or the cookie_file either.

I believe this will work for you, but I'd like to suggest some potentially better options too -- if you use Lynx frequently in other situations where you do want a prompt to accept or reject cookies, then I suggest adding the "--accept-all-cookies" flag on the command line when invoking Lynx to access mobile.wunderground.com (possibly in a shell alias or a script that parses the weather output).  Alternatively you could set "cookie_accept_domains=.wunderground.com" in your .lynxrc, as a way to avoid globally accepting all cookies but avoiding prompts for this one specific domain. 

-Brian