Large file download script

Hello,

I'm using a script that allows my clients to download files from my store. The problem I'm running into is that for some reason the download stops at around 5 minutes. I'm guessing it's hitting the max_execute_limit set by the web host.

Below is the code that I'm currently using. Can anyone suggestion a different method to allow people to download large files?

What I think would be if I could redirect the user to the actual file once I validate that the person has access to the file but that would mean giving the person direct access to the folder which I don't want to do.

function readfile_chunked($file_name,$ret_bytes=true) {
    // important for large files
    set_time_limit(0);
    // determine memory limit
    //$memory_limit = (int)get_cfg_var('memory_limit');
    //if($memory_limit==0) $memory_limit = 1;
    $memory_limit = 1;
    $chunksize = $memory_limit*(1024*1024);
    $buffer = '';
    $cnt =0;
    $handle = fopen($file_name, 'rb');
   if ($handle === false) {
       return false;
   }
   while (!feof($handle)) {
       $buffer = fread($handle, $chunksize);
       echo $buffer;
       ob_flush();
       flush();
       if ($retbytes) {
           $cnt += strlen($buffer);
       }
   }
       $status = fclose($handle);
       exit;
   if ($retbytes && $status) {
       return $cnt;
   }
   return $status;
}

PHP:

Thanks in advance.

 

Too bad I have to get going to bed to be up early or I would play around with this and give you a better solution. However, you could try copying the file to a location where you can give a direct link then use PHP's unlink(); command to remove the file after the user has downloaded it. The most effective way to run the unlink would be from a script running on cron that maybe takes file names from a DB and removes them all every 30 minutes to an hour (run the script every 30 minutes, but have a time in DB so if a user downloads a file 1min before cron runs, they can continue their download). Maybe if I have a chance tomorrow I'll come back to this one. Very good question If someone else doesn't come up with a solution, I wish you the best of luck and will check back when I have time tomorrow to see if I can give you a great solution!

Regards,
Dennis M.