Force Download A Pdf

[jonpugh114]

Hello,

 

I need to force download a PDF file instead of displaying it in the browser, any idea how I'd do this?

 

This is what I've tried:

 

      $file = 'file.pdf';
       header('Content-type: application/pdf');
       header ("Content-type: octet/stream");
       header ("Content-disposition: attachment; filename=".$file.";");
       header("Content-Length: ".filesize($file));
       readfile($file);
       exit;

 

This appears to force the download, but when I try to open it I'm told that it's either empty or can't be read. Any ideas?

 

Thanks,

 

Jon

[Paul Swanson]

You need to set some special headers in the page, instead of just a link to the URL of the document:

 

header ("Content-Type: application/pdf");
header ("Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=\"$filename\"");  // $filename is the name of the file
header ("Content-Length: $filesize");  // $filesize is derived by using filesize() on the file
header ("Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary");
readfile ($location);  // $location is the URL, including filename, of the file

This should present the user with a dialog box that asks them whether they want to open or save the file.

[jonpugh114]

I've still got the same problem, the pdf downloads but it's either empty or corrupt. Any thoughts?

[jonpugh114]

Actually I've sorted it, I was calling the file in from another directory, I'm not entirely sure what the problem was but I resolved by placing the download script in the same directory as the PDF's.

 

Thanks,

 

Jon