Spidering URL's

[whitchman]

ok lets say i wanna do something like this:

$i = 1;

while ($i < 50) {

download (http://somesite.com/zips/$i/something.zip);

$i++;

}

and then have it put that file in a certain directory based on what $i was. How would I do this? Keep in mind I'm a super programming newbie. I realize that "download" isn't real but what would go in its place?

[eoghain]

Look at the [man]fopen/man command this is what you are looking for to do the download. It's also what you would use to write the file to your local hard disk. There are other functions that will help out but ther are all right there next to [man]fopen/man.

[JakesSA]

Firstly, thats not spidering. Seconly, it would be easier to stick your downloads (*.zip) in one folder and then catelogue the names in a table to pull out the information that you need corrosponding to that download.

//stick data info assoc array to pull the data

$download = array('one.zip', 'two.zip', 'three.zip'); 
$x = count($download);
for($i=0; $i<$x; $i++)
  {
  echo $download[$i];
}

[whitchman]

ok so if i do this:

$i = 1;

while ($i < 50) {

fopen (http://somesite.com/zips/$i/something.zip);

$i++;

}

where does it put the files? would i need something like:

fopen (url);
put_it_here (path);

[JakesSA]

$download = array('one.zip', 'two.zip', 'three.zip'); 
$x = count($download);
for($i=0; $i<$x; $i++)
  {
  echo "http://somesite.com/zips/" . $download[$i];
}

Anyway, that was my pennies worth

[superwormy]

After you've downloaded, to write the new file:

$open = fopen ("pathtoLOCALfile/filenameofnewfile.zip", "w+");
fwrite ($open, $contents);
fclose ($open);

www.php.net/fopen
www.php.net/fsockopen
www.php.net/fread
www.php.net/fclose

[whitchman]

ok superwormy, so right after this happens...

fopen (http://somesite.com/zips/$i/something.zip);

...where does the file exist? In the memory? on the disk?

where does this....

fwrite ($open, $contents);

...put the file? does $contents have to be a defined variable before i can put it in there?

[superwormy]

OK, FIRST, you need to download the first file:

$filepointer = fopen ("http://www.domainname.com/filetoopen.zip", "r");
$contents = fread ($open, 999999999);
fclose ($filepointer);

Now that has opened the remote file in READ-ONLY mode, and then has taken all the contents of the file and put it into the variable '$contents'. Now you have to write that file to the appropriate directory. So first you have to open a new filepointer and create the new file:

$filepointer = fopen ("/localplace/to/put/file.zip", "w+");
fwrite ($filepointer, $contents);
fclose ($filepointer);

That opens the local file, writes the $contents to the directory, and closes the filepointer again. You should be able to get the rest by yourself. Go read the manual too.

www.php.net/fopen
www.php.net/fread
www.php.net/fwrite
www.php.net/fclose

[superwormy]

As an additional note, the $filepointer variable is simply a pionter to the file you are operating on. fopen() returns the file pointer for whatever you opened with it.

[whitchman]

ok so i tried that and got this error

Notice: Undefined variable: open in c:\dn\test.php on line 3

Warning: fread(): supplied argument is not a valid File-Handle resource in c:\dn\test.php on line 3

and what is with the 9999999?

[superwormy]

The 9999999 is how many bytes of the file to read. If it was a local file you would use filesize(); to find that out, but its not, its a remote file, and its just easier to use 9999999 instead of trying to read the file in in antoher spot adn getting the filesize.

Why don't you post your code so we can see whats on line 3?