Download queue

the0ne

Hey guys 🙂

I wanna make a PHP system that will allow 10 users to download at the same time and then if anymore press download they have to wait till one of the 10 finishes like fileplanet and other sites have.. but how can i detect when someone is done downloading? if this is possible at all... I hope u guys can help me out. 🙂

epp_b

I think sessions may be useful. Maybe read how many sessions are set from the session storage directory on the server, and don't allow any more if the count is 10.

I haven't read up too deeply on sessions, but it looks like it would probably be something worth looking into.

rohithmr

AS epp_b suggested, I think Sessions can get the job done. Hers my take on it, all downloads shudd b redirected to one php file, say download.php.

The download.php starts a session, enters a the session id to a Database and starts the download. When download.php is called again, it shudd check the number of Session ids entered in teh database and if it is already 10, give teh user an error message and if not add their session id to the database and start the databse.

One serious drawback of this approach is that u cant determine when a download actually gets done. I wudd suggest using a timeout. SO that after the specified time, all session ids, will be considered expired and deleted from the DB. But this is not a very practical solution cuz the download time varies drastically with the client's bandwidth.

the0ne

Ya that is exactly my problem.. i dont know when the guy is done downloading,... but im looking at the readfile() i think it may be able to help me out 🙂

epp_b

Have the user click a link that removes the session id when he/she is finished downloading (make it big and clear that they should click the link). But use the timeout as a buffer, just in case the user neglects to click the link.

the0ne

Well i'd like it to be done auto.. so far i have this:

<?
require('connect.php');
        mysql_query("insert into quote (quote) 
  	values ('start')");
header( "Content-Length: ".filesize('file.zip'));
header( "Content-Type: application/octet-stream" );
header( "Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=file.zip");
readfile(file.zip');
flush();
        mysql_query("insert into quote (quote) 
  	values ('theend')");
?>

But it just adds the theend in the database right after you goto the page :[ the flush didn't help me out either.. anyone got an idea how to make this work?

diego25

Unfortunately, I don't think it can be done in PHP. The reason is because if you use readfile or anything to send the file, your PHP script will timeout if the file is huge and takes more than 30 seconds to download. If you do it any other way, PHP won't be able to tell when the download is finished. So PHP is out of the question.

One way you could solve this is by creating a public account on your FTP server, and then limit the number of users that may login with that public account. I'm sure you've seen before when downloading through FTP that "You are 4 of 25 allowed connections", or something like that. You'd be doing the same thing.

Diego