title: Why does session cookie only show '.com' for the DOMAIN when viewed in IE8?
body: <p>I am using the following code to set a session cookie</p>
  
  <pre><code>        HttpCookie cookie = new HttpCookie("visitId");
          cookie.Value = value;
          cookie.Domain = ".example.com";
  
          Response.Cookies.Set(cookie);
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>This works fine, although I was surprised to see in IE8 when I hit F12 (developer tools) and then 'Cache > View Cookie Information' I get the following. It says '.com' instead of 'example.com'</p>
  
  <pre><code>NAME  visitId 
  VALUE  1472215 
  DOMAIN  .com 
  PATH  / 
  EXPIRES  At the end of the Session 
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>The HTTP header sent says this :</p>
  
  <pre><code>Set-Cookie: visitId=1472215; domain=.example.com; path=/
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Whats going on? Why is IE8 showing only .com for the domain? Is this just the way session cookies work. That doesnt make sense of course.</p>
  
  <p>What was interesting to me is that a persistent cookie shows this, when set using the same code.</p>
  
  <pre><code>NAME  userGUID 
  VALUE  e1cbe4f3-6300-44e1-a702-b449d5711816 
  DOMAIN  example.com 
  PATH  / 
  EXPIRES  3/27/2010 1:05:14 AM 
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Am I misunderstanding something or is this just a bug in their 'cookie' display logic?</p>
  
  <p>I've verified at least that it isn't sending the cookies to stackoverflow.com :-)</p>