Salesforce Session variables, set and get variables in Session

Question

I want to be able to read / write some variables to the current session in my Salesforce site pages.

I have a site built using Salesforce Sites, I need to store/retrieve some values across all the pages (consider that I am building something similar to a shopping cart). However I cant find any good example on how to read and write variables to the session (anonymous user).

I am using Visualforce pages with several controllers built in Apex.

Regards

Answer 1

If you are building something like a shopping cart, or a "wizard" where you need to keep controller variables in context from one page view to another, then the best way to do this in VisualForce is to use the same controller.

When the user submits a form ( through actionFunctions, commandButtons, or commandLinks, etc.), and your controller returns a page Reference, the view state is preserved if the new visual force page uses the same controller.

In this way, you could, for example, have the user enter their name and email address using apex:inputField tags on page one. They navigate to page two, which uses the same controller as page one, and the page could reference the same controller variables. Essentially, the controller is still in scope, and so are all the variables that were updates.

Example:

Page one:

<apex:page controller="myController">
   Please enter your name <apex:inputText value="{!shopper_name}"/>
   <br/>
   <apex:commandButton action="{!pageTwo}" value="Click for page two"/>
</apex:page>

Page two:

<apex:page controller="myController">
   You entered: <apex:outputText value="{!shopper_name}" />.
</apex:page>

Controller:

public class myController {
  public string shopper_name { get; set; }
  public myController() {
    shopper_name = null;
  }
}