Opera BrowserI finally figured out why I’ve had so much trouble logging into sites with the latest version of Opera! (I’ve actually had to log into My Opera using Firefox. How’s that for irony?)

It’s all down to “Treat as specified in Server Manager,” which seems to be either the default or the way an old preference got interpreted after upgrading. First of all, you get to Server Manager by clicking on the “Manage cookies…” button. I’d been looking for something labeled Server Manager and didn’t find anything. Secondly, it seems to mean “Ignore any cookie for a site that isn’t explicitly listed in Server Manager.”

Once I added my.opera.com to the list, I was able to log in.

I may switch to “Accept all cookies,” though, since I’ve finally figured out another cookie issue.

A nice feature in Firefox lets you choose how long to keep cookies: until they expire (which could be years from now), or until you close the browser. You can set exceptions for sites that you want to remember your settings. So sites that require cookies will work, but you can clear out all the junk just by closing Firefox, and it will keep only the cookies you want.

Opera has a similar feature, “Delete new cookies when exiting Opera.” There’s no way to define an exception, but you can fudge your way around it by unchecking the box, then visiting the site, then checking the box again. (That way it’s not a new cookie at the point the feature is turned on.) It’s kind of roundabout, but it seems to work.

Edit: Still trying to work out the settings for third-party cookies. If www.example.com sets a cookie for example.com, it considers that third-party, so if you block third-party cookies, it ignores that cookie entirely. But setting third-party cookies to “Let me choose each time” just seems to accept it.

Sense, it makes not.

6 thoughts on “Opera Cookie Weirdness Explained (sort of)

  1. Thanks for the tips regarding cookies. I also prefer the manner in which Firefox handles cookies but what can you do? I see your workaround. I’m wondering if it’s worth the effort. Is it better just to flush everything out when exiting and then renew it all when you log on? I guess it’s a matter of preference.

  2. Opera does in fact have a feature for keeping certain cookies from being deleted when you close it, altough it is a less-known feature…

    1. Go to Tools > Advanced > Cookies

    2. Click on the name of the site/address you want to keep a cookie for (not any sub-folders or files just the actual name)

    3. Click on edit and un-check “use defaults for normal cookies”, then check the four options below it.

    This will make Opera keep the cookie for the site you selected. Test it by setting Opera to delete cookies on close and then close and re-open Opera, the cookies you have just edited will be saved.

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  3. […] So far there are only two things I don’t like about it. I still have problems getting it to handle cookies the way I want it to, even with the new site-specific preferences. It looks like I should be able to tell it to delete all new cookies when closing except for particular sites, which I do in Firefox, but I still have to use the workaround from Opera 8 where I disable the setting, visit the site to get the “remember my login” cookie, close the browser, then re-enable it. […]

  4. I’ve been trying to get Opera to accept a cookie from a particular web site with no success. I have tried every combination I can think of, including setting Cookies>Advanced to “Accept Cookies” and setting the particular domain to “Accept Cookies.” But this particular web site still says I have cookies blocked. Any idea why that might be?

    FWIW, the site is http://www.rvwiki.org, running WikiMedia 1.4rc1. I couldn’t find any evidence of cookie problems with WikiMedia, so I suspect the problem is with Opera.

  5. You can add exceptions to websites in Opera alright. Go to the website whose cookie you want to keep, right-click on empty space, Edit Site Preferences… and then on the Cookies tab, uncheck Delete new cookies when exiting Opera.

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