Hide Download URL

[Extreme43]

Hey, I searched the Faqs and the Thread search wasnt working so i decided to post =]

I want to hide the URL of a download and have no idea how to do it
i have searched google a bit but didnt find anything relevant can anyone help me ?

 

[Chacalinc]

you could do it through a form with post method using <hidden> vars.

<form name="download" method="post" action="download.php">
<input type="hidden" name="file" value="file.ext">
<input type="submit" value="Download it!">

 

[jpadie]

not sure what you mean here.

is that you want to stop the user finding out the url of a file in a directory altogether (in which case you could replace the link with a php script that checks a session timeout value and if within a short period of time could deliver the file)

if you just want to occlude the url but are ok with it being in the source code then Chacalinc's solution works well

 

[Extreme43]

nah i acutally want to hide the directory completly
i dont really know what code to use i know what you mean kind of but not sure how to implement it

 

[Chacalinc]

ok.. the download.php should have header()'s, something like this:

header("Content-Type: application/octet-stream");
header('Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="'.$_POST['file'].'"');
header('Content-Length: '.$filesize);
readfile($storagelocation.$filename);

(take a look the header function in

http://www.php.net).

 

[jpadie]

Try the code below. it would be better to hook up the file ids to a mysql database but hardcoding was quicker!

of course you need read access to the documents directory for the apache/web user but make sure that other users do not have access.

Note: i've not checked this code (but it should work!).

<?php
//say file to download is ../dir/file.doc

// self-managing page might look like this

$timelimit = 5; //in minutes

if (!isset($_GET['DLID']))
{
  displaystartpage();
}
else
{
  if (validdownload() === true)
  {
    unset ($_SESSION['time']);
    downloadfile($_GET[DLID]);
  }
  else
  {
    unset ($_SESSION['time']);
    die("This download link has expired");
  }
}

function validdownload()
{
  session_start();
  global ($timelimit);
  $mins = $timelimit * 60; //this converts to seconds
  $elapsedtime = time() - $_SESSION['time'];
  if ($elapsedtime > $mins)
  {return false;}
  else
  {return true;}
}

function downloadfile($id)
{
  $dir = "../dir/"; //need to include the trailing slash

  switch ($id)
  {
    case 1:
      $file = "file.txt";
      if (!file_exists($dir.$file))
      { die ("File does not exist");}
      $len = filesize($dir.$file);
      header("Content-Type: application/octet-stream");
      $header="Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=$file;";
      header($header);
      header("Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary");
      header("Content-Length: ".$len);
      readfile($dir.$file);
      
      break;
    
    default:
      die ("No such download exists");
      break;
  }
}

function displaystartpage()
{
  session_start();
  global ($timelimit);
  $_SESSION['time'] = time();
  echo "Click <a href='$_POST[PHP_SELF]?DLID=1'>here</a> to download file.  You have $timelimit minutes to do so.";
}


?>