strange text in localhost url

Question

I am using development server, not IIS (I think) and my url strings are coming out differently when I try to browse to the page I'm working on.

The usual way they looked; localhost:44044/Account/Register.aspx

Now they look like this; localhost:44044/(S(rzoxv2lrex3xsh1o1lsfdnpf))/Account/Register.aspx

Does anyone have a clue where that section after localhost comes from? And I'm wondering if that's why I'm getting a specified cast error now when I try to run the page (it was working earlier)

Answer 1

Looks like a cookieless session identifier in ASP.Net. This is caused by how the application is configured in web.config.

Check for: <sessionState cookieless="true" /> at the web.config or machine.config level.

As far as your casting error goes, we would need to see some code. If your configuration has changed (as the cookieless session implies), then your application could be failing due to another configuration change.

See also: Cookieless sessions in asp.net