HTTP Session Timeout

External

• https://community.jboss.org/wiki/HttpSessionTimeout
• What is the session timeout hierarchy in JBoss EAP? https://access.redhat.com/solutions/31400

Internal

• HTTP Session
• web.xml

Overview

Ideally, a session would be invalidated as soon as the user closed his browser, browsed to a different site, or stepped away from his desk. Unfortunately, there is no way for a server to detect any of these events. Consequently, sessions live throughout some period of inactivity after which the server assumes the user must have left and it's not worth holding session state for her anymore.

The timeout doesn't directly influence the total life time of a session. It only specifies the time interval between two subsequent requests after which the session should be considered invalid.

The default timeout (in minutes) can be specified using web.xml:

<web-app>
    ....
    <session-config>
        <session-timeout>60</session-timeout>
    </session-config>    
</web-app>

Setting the Session Timeout on Server

The server-wide place to set up the session timeout is:

• JBoss 5.x: ${JBOSS_HOME}/server/${JBOSS_PROFILE}/deployers/jbossweb.deployer/web.xml
• JBoss 4: ${JBOSS_HOME}/server/${JBOSS_PROFILE}/deploy/jbossweb-tomcat-50.sar/web.xml
• EAP 6:

/subsystem=web:write-attribute(name=default-session-timeout,value=15)
<subsystem xmlns="urn:jboss:domain:web:2.2" default-virtual-server="default-host" native="false" default-session-timeout="15">

Note that "jboss:domain:web:1.5" does not seem to specify this attribute, so it is not clear how to set it for that JBoss EAP version and earlier.

HTTP Session Timeout API

Timeout can be also individually configured for a session using:

public void HttpSession.setMaxInactiveInterval(int secs)