If your sessions aren't keeping data between pages, your code is broken. Just about every php program out there these days uses sessions for something. Yes they're supported, and yes they should retain data between pages and refreshes. For database users, yes you can share the same database with two database users. Make sure to take this into consideration when designing software though (e.g. lock tables when they're being modified, etc.), otherwise more than one user might try changing the same data at the same time.