Magento 1.9 Can’t login to admin panel!

Question

I have installed Magento 1.9. It was working well for a week. Suddenly yesterday, when I tried to log in to the Magento admin panel and I typed username and password, clicked the Login button and nothing happened. The page refreshes and that’s all. No error or any other messages.

If I entered the wrong username or password, It shows an error.

After I googled about this issue, I was recommended to comment the following lines in:

app\code\core\Mage\Core\Model\Session\Abstract\Varien.php

/* to solve login issue */
  /*if (!$cookieParams['httponly']) {
  unset($cookieParams['httponly']);
  if (!$cookieParams['secure']) {
  unset($cookieParams['secure']);
  if (!$cookieParams['domain']) {
  unset($cookieParams['domain']);
  }
  }
  }
   
if (isset($cookieParams['domain'])) {
  $cookieParams['domain'] = $cookie->getDomain();*/ //I have commented these lines

And for some older versions below was recommended in the same file.

$cookieParams = array(           
    'lifetime' => $cookie->getLifetime(),           
    'path'     => $cookie->getPath(),           
    //'domain'   => $cookie->getConfigDomain()           
    //'secure'   => $cookie->isSecure(),           
    //'httponly' => $cookie->getHttponly()       
);
  }*/

Even after that, I could not log in to admin. It is as it was. Did anyone face this issue? Is there any other solution to this issue?

(I tried clearing cache and session through FTP).

Answer 1

While it may offer you a temporarily solution, you should considering not modifying the core code like that to solve problems. Changing the source code of an application will create problems that are much more difficult to track down.

There's a number of different issues that cause the errorless admin login behavior you're seeing, but they all go back to Magento not being able to set or read the session cookie. Magento uses sessions to pass error messages between pages — that's why you don't see an error message. Magento also uses sessions to store the "is logged in" value, so not setting sessions also causes the core error behavior.

Possible causes include

• Local computer time vs. server time mismatch, causing instant cookie invalidation. Make sure your server time is correct.

• Incorrect permissions on var/session, preventing session files from being saved

• Incorrect configuration of database/redis/other session storage, preventing saving of session values

• A module is instantiating sessions to early, preventing the correct session names from being set

• You're a developer using multiple URLs and have multiple cookie domains

• Another developer has somehow modified app\code\core\Mage\Core\Model\Session\Abstract\Varien.php, creating a hard to track down bug

• The cookie domain in System -> Configuration -> Web -> Session Cookie Management doesn't match the actual site domain.

• You're using the localhost as your server domain, and using a version of webkit that has trouble/bugs setting cookies for localhost in some situations.

The short term fix is to just delete your cookie for the domain. That's often enough to solve the problem. If it persists, figure out which of the above reasons is the reason for your error, and take steps to address it (fix permissions, etc.)

Answer 2

I'm having the same symptoms on some Magento installations(not only 1.9). In my case, it happens only in Chrome. I'm fixing this by logging in Firefox/Safari/Opera, and changing 'Use HTTP only' to 'No' in 'Session Cookies Management' of the 'Web' settings.

Answer 3

I had this problem too. Turned out sessions couldn't get written to var/session, even though the directory itself is set to 0777. Magento created session files, but they all remained zero bytes.

Changing session storage from files to db solved the problem for me.

Answer 4

1. Open your Magento installation directory. Locate and open index.php file.
2. Search for error_reporting(E_ALL | E_STRICT); code.

3. Comment it out like that:

   /*error_reporting(E_ALL | E_STRICT);*/

4. And use the following code instead:

   error_reporting(E_ALL);

   $_SERVER['MAGE_IS_DEVELOPER_MODE'] = true;

5. Uncomment it by removing the # sign, so it looks like that:

   ini_set('display_errors', 1);

6. Save this file and upload to the server. Reload your website page to see errors.

Answer 5

Another possible reason: harddisk/volume/quota is full and so the session data can't be written to disk. May seem unlikely, but just happened the second time to me and took a while to figure out.

I don't have enough reputation to comment, but @Alan Storm, maybe you want to take this in your excellent list.

Answer 6

I recently had the same problem and simple trick worked for me. Also this is for people who cannot access the dashboard on Google Chrome. If you can work on Mozilla Firefox then please do so because I guess this issue is not persistent on Mozilla firefox.

So the solution for chrome is:

Goto System->Configuration->Web. Expand the Unsecure and Secure tab. Change the Base URL to http://127.0.0.1/[Your folder name] if you are using localhost or change it to your Site URL through which you are accessing the frontend. I had to login twice to get to the Dashboard since when I entered the details for the first time, it just refreshes and comes back to the same page as you mentioned it as looping.

Answer 7

Open your phpMyAdmin from your host try once this sql command.

Run this SQL:

SET FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS=0;
UPDATE core_store SET store_id = 0 WHERE code='admin';
UPDATE core_store_group SET group_id = 0 WHERE name='Default';
UPDATE core_website SET website_id = 0 WHERE code='admin';
UPDATE customer_group SET customer_group_id = 0 WHERE customer_group_code='NOT LOGGED IN';SET FOREIGN_KEY_CHECKS=1;

Now admin can able to log in.

Please follow this:

Admin page shows 404 pages not found

Answer 8

I had the same problem and I solved it by deleting all files in /var/session . I think it's because too many session in Magento!

Answer 9

Alarm Storm List is correct and detailed. Here are couple of additional cases.

1. In vagrant, check permission of var/session on host Machine too
   (mounting issues)
2. Check if you disk is full or too many files in var/session
3. Run n98-magerun.phar sys:check (catches issues including cookie domain)

4. Change session to database by editing local.xml. It will rule out most permission issues by using insidie <global>

   <session_save><![CDATA[db]]></session_save>
   

Also be vary of third party extensions (firewall/security extensions) for example https://github.com/paimpozhil/MageFirewall/blob/master/app/code/community/MageFirewall/Firewall/Model/Observer.php#L53 puts you on black list if you try too many times.

Can happen if your session is originally not working for permission issues but then continue failing even after you fix original issue

In your particular case keep an eye on admin_session_user_login_success event as most security /firewall modules use this event. Specially keep an eye if variable $_SESSION['admin'] is reset by observers

Answer 10

It’s also important that you have a form key present, otherwise your form won’t get processed.

<?php echo $this->getBlockHtml('formkey'); ?>

Answer 11

A simple solution to this problem is to use http://127.0.0.1 as you hostname instead of localhost.

Since the problem is that you cannot log in to your admin, you should change the secure and unsecure base urls in the database tabel: core_config_data

This will also have your baseurl validate with n98-magerun's sys:check

Answer 12

If you are developing on localhost and have set or changed your domain name to localhost, update your database table core_config_data domain names to 127.0.0.1 instead. E.g. UPDATE core_config_data SET value="http://127.0.0.1/magento/" WHERE path="web/unsecure/base_url";

Answer 13

Also, you can update the password in the database if everything else from above didn't work and you need desperate access:

UPDATE admin_user SET password=CONCAT(MD5('qXpassword'), ':qX') WHERE username=‘user’;

replace user and password words according to your needs.

Answer 14

First of all try to clear you cache I think and if this does not work, try to make chmod 700 on your var folder.

Answer 15

You can changed your browser may be this work for me . When this error comes i have changed browser chrome to firefox and it working .

Answer 16

The same thing happened with me a while ago and my problem came from the session. I didn't have enough DISK space to create the sessions and cache from var/. I removed some stuff and everything worked after. Maybe it will help someone.

Cheers

Answer 17

Try to clear your cache by emptying the folder "var/cache" and "var/session", this solved it for me.

I also had to restart the webserver after it once.

Answer 18

For me the error was with the default CAPTCHA of magento. Set "Enable CAPTCHA in Admin" to "No". If you don't have a seccond admin user to login change this to DB.

UPDATE `core_config_data` SET `value`='0' WHERE  `path`= "admin/captcha/enable";

If you want to check the exact error change TEMPORARY file app/code/core/Mage/Admin/Model/Session.php. (Remember to restore the file back after you check the error.)

public function login($username, $password, $request = null)
{
    .....
    } catch (Mage_Core_Exception $e) {
        $e->setMessage(
            Mage::helper('adminhtml')->__('You did not sign in correctly or your account is temporarily disabled.')
        );
        .....
    }
    .....
}

Show the actual error

public function login($username, $password, $request = null)
{
    .....
    } catch (Mage_Core_Exception $e) {
        $e->setMessage($e->getMessage());
        .....
    }
    .....
}