file download to binary instead of application

snootch

Please help. I'm doing this tutorial from http://www.php-mysql-tutorial.com/upload-to-file-server.php where the files are not stored in the datebase but moved to a specified folder and renamed (to avoid overwriting files with the same name).

The upload script seems to work exactly as intended. I can go into the "specified folder" in my file manager in my web hosting control panel and the files open with their associated application (i.e. .xls files open with MS Excel). However, when I click on the links generated by the download2.php script it outputs the binary garbage to the browser window rather than opening the file with the associated application. If I right-click to download, the file comes up as "download2.php" and the file type as html.

I also get the "can't modify header" errors if the leave the header calls in the script. The header calls are before any HTML tags, so why do I still get those errors. I don't get the errors, if I take them out of the script, but the files still output as binary.

Can someone please help? Here's download2.php code:

<?php 
error_reporting(E_ALL); 
if(isset($_GET['id'])) 
{ 
    include 'library/config.php'; 
    include 'library/opendb.php'; 

$id      = $_GET['id']; 
$query   = "SELECT name, type, size, path FROM upload2 WHERE id = '$id'"; 
$result  = mysql_query($query) or die('Error, query failed'); 
list($name, $type, $size, $filePath) = mysql_fetch_array($result); 

header("Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=$name"); 
header("Content-length: $size"); 
header("Content-type: $type"); 

readfile($filePath); 

include 'library/closedb.php';     
exit; 
} 

?> 

<html> 
<head> 
<title>Download File From MySQL</title> 
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> 
</head> 

<body> 
<?php 
include 'library/config.php'; 
include 'library/opendb.php'; 

$query  = "SELECT id, name FROM upload2"; 
$result = mysql_query($query) or die('Error, query failed'); 
if(mysql_num_rows($result) == 0) 
{ 
    echo "Database is empty <br>"; 
}  

else 
{ 
    while(list($id, $name) = mysql_fetch_array($result)) 
    { 
?> 
    <a href="download2.php?id=<?=$id;?>"><?=$name;?></a> <br> 
<?php         

    } 
} 
include 'library/closedb.php'; 
?> 
</body> 
</html>

Quadodo

<?php
ob_start();
error_reporting(E_ALL);
if(isset($_GET['id']))
{
    include 'library/config.php';
    include 'library/opendb.php';

$id      = $_GET['id'];
$query   = "SELECT name, type, size, path FROM upload2 WHERE id = '$id'";
$result  = mysql_query($query) or die('Error, query failed');
list($name, $type, $size, $filePath) = mysql_fetch_array($result);

header("Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=$name");
header("Content-length: $size");
header("Content-type: $type");

readfile($filePath);

include 'library/closedb.php';     
exit;
}

?>

<html>
<head>
<title>Download File From MySQL</title>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
</head>

<body>
<?php
include 'library/config.php';
include 'library/opendb.php';

$query  = "SELECT id, name FROM upload2";
$result = mysql_query($query) or die('Error, query failed');
if(mysql_num_rows($result) == 0)
{
    echo "Database is empty <br>";
}  

else
{
    while(list($id, $name) = mysql_fetch_array($result))
    {
?>
    <a href="download2.php?id=<?=$id;?>"><?=$name;?></a> <br>
<?php         

    }
}
include 'library/closedb.php';
?>
</body>
</html>
<?php
ob_end_flush();
?>

I added an output buffer on it, also if there are any headers in the config.php remove them 😃

snootch

Thanks Quadodo! That seems to work well with PDF files, but for some reason other document types and even images (JPEG & GIF) won't open properly even if they're saved to the computer first.

I've checked the file type field in the database using phpmyadmin and the upload script puts in the correct information (i.e. application/msword) for each type of file.

Do you (or anyone else) know why that might be? I've tried looking up more info on "ob_start();" but the stuff I've found is too generic.

Any additional insights would be greatly appreciated.