Sending out binary data from a php script

[Anon]

Hello, Im trying to send out some binary data that someone can download. What function would I use for this and is there any way to automatically detect the mime type? Thanks

[Anon]

You are trying to send out binary data from where? An SQL Database? Very confused on exactly what you are trying to do... let me know so i can help 🙂

[Anon]

Heh, thanks. Its in a regular web directory. So Ill have to open it too, but I think I can figure out that part. And what its doing is as soon as they go to the page it downloads without any header()'s or metas. It has to be binary.

[Anon]

If you want to grab a file from your web directory you could use the fgets function.
Here is an example:

<?
// open file and print each line
if($myFile = fopen($data.txt", "r"))
{
while(!feof($myFile))
{
$myLine = fgets($myFile, 255);
print($myLine);
}
fclose($myFile);
}
?>

[Anon]

Headers are automatically included, and by default the Content-type is text/html (from the browser's point of view), so you will have to start out by using the header() function to send an appropriate Content-type line for the type of binary data you're sending.

To send the binary data, use fopen(), fpassthru(), and fclose().

[Anon]

Got it all working, thanks

[Anon]

This sounds to me like a very nice function.

Can you post a snippet of your code here?