are SESSION's necessary or can Auth keep track of a user

[eluser]Colin Williams[/eluser]
ray73864, that information isn't 100% accurate. CI's Session class handles sessions differently than native PHP. For one, the session doesn't expire when the browser window closes. Also, the session lifetime is configurable (you could make it 5 days, 5 weeks, whatever you prefer), and it will be reset after n seconds of inactivity.