FAQ:

How do you log off? Suppose I log in with the guest username but later I want to use another username, how do I log off from the guest user name?

Answer:

To log off from a TWiki site, you must exit your browser and reconnect to the site. When asked, enter the new username and password.

Why is this?

Many TWiki sites use HTTP Basic Authentication, which pops up a window asking for username and password. Once entered, the browser remembers them, and supplies them as part of subsequent references to the site.

HTTP is a stateless protocol. The web server remembers nothing about a user between individual access -- and it can take several accesses to load a single page. The web browser must remember the state of each transaction. You are never really "logged into" a web site -- you have given the browser the codes to unlock each request. Only if the browser does not have credentials to present to a site will it ask for them.

Most browsers do not give the user a way to "forget" the username and password. To log in as a different user, you must exit the browser (perhaps all instances of the browser), and reconnect to the TWiki site.

Back to: TWikiFAQ

-- TWiki:Main/CarlMikkelsen - 14 Apr 2003