Integrating CakePHP with PEAR:Auth

If you have a web-site which uses PEAR::Auth, and another section of your site using CakePHP, you’d probably find it baffling that your CakePHP doesn’t remember your authentication cookie. In addition, CakePHP wouldn’t redirect properly after logging in.

The main reason is CakePHP overrides the standard PHP session environment, see cake/lib/session.php

  ini_set('session.use_trans_sid', 0);
  ini_set('session.name', CAKE_SESSION_COOKIE);
  ini_set('session.cookie_lifetime', $this->cookieLifeTime
  ini_set('session.cookie_path', $this->path);
  ini_set('session.gc_probability', 1);

The solution is to change admin/config/core.php

    define('CAKE_SESSION_SAVE', null);

The other problem you’d encounter is because the REQUEST_URI points to the base controller PHP file, and not your current URL. In your controller file, say, app/controller/blogs_controller.php

    function beforeFilter()
    {
         this->checkSession();
    }

    function checkSession()
    {
        require_once("MDB2.php");
        require_once("Auth.php");
        require_once("../../../config.php");
        $auth = new Auth("DB", $dsn, "", false);
        $auth->start();
        if (!$auth->checkAuth())
        {
            $returnURL = $_SERVER['REDIRECT_URL'];
            header("Location: /login.php?return=" . $returnURL);
            exit;
        }
   }