Thread: download binary files to browser

Hello,

I'm keeping binary documents in PostgreSQL and serving them out with PHP,
but I can't figure out how to make the download seamless for the
non-technical end users.

Let's say I have a table documents (docid integer, docoid oid, name
varchar(256)) with a row (123, 123456, 'blah.xyz') that refers to some
some sort of binary file. docid is the primary key.

What should happen:
 user hits URL http://my.site.com/download.php3?docid=123
 user sees the download window in his browser and the download window
already has the file name as "blah.xyz".

What happens:
 I retrieve the LO and send it out with the MIME type
application/octet-stream and the download window comes up with the file
name "download.php3" regardless of the file name.

What headers can I send to fill in that file name?

Thanks
 --Louis  <louis@bertrandtech.on.ca>

Louis Bertrand       http://www.bertrandtech.on.ca/
Bertrand Technical Services, Bowmanville, ON, Canada
Tel: +1.905.623.1500  Fax: +1.905.623.3852

OpenBSD: Secure by default.  http://www.openbsd.org/

Louis Bertrand (louis@bertrandtech.on.ca) wrote:
> What headers can I send to fill in that file name?

Look at content-disposition in the HTTP RFC.

I do this in a similar application:
header("Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=\"$original_name\"");

it helps on the end-user side if you also report the correct
MIME type for the document (i.e. application/msword).

header("Content-type: $mime");

Hey, that's probably what I've been looking for!

As for the mime type, I just read that there is a variable in recent
versions of PHP, $userfile_type, that may get sent up by the uploading
browser. I'll store that if availabe to give the user's browser the same
hint.

Thanks
 --Louis  <louis@bertrandtech.on.ca>

Louis Bertrand       http://www.bertrandtech.on.ca/
Bertrand Technical Services, Bowmanville, ON, Canada
Tel: +1.905.623.1500  Fax: +1.905.623.3852

OpenBSD: Secure by default.  http://www.openbsd.org/

On Sun, 7 Jan 2001, Stephen van Egmond wrote:

> Louis Bertrand (louis@bertrandtech.on.ca) wrote:
> > What headers can I send to fill in that file name?
>
> Look at content-disposition in the HTTP RFC.
>
> I do this in a similar application:
> header("Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=\"$original_name\"");
>
> it helps on the end-user side if you also report the correct
> MIME type for the document (i.e. application/msword).
>
> header("Content-type: $mime");
>
>