Temporary download link<\/b> is very useful to sell digital goods on the website. It provides a secure way to share the download link of the digital products. The user allows downloading the file only one time, after the download the link is expired or removed. The one-time download link is ideal to give a digital product (code, music, video, etc) to a single person and expire the link once the product is downloaded.<\/p>\n
With the single-use download link<\/b>, you don’t need to manually monitor the download activity in order to change the download link. Instead, the download link will be expired immediately after the first download. In this tutorial, we will show you how to generate one-time download link in PHP<\/b> and implement the temporary download URL functionality on the web application using PHP.<\/p>\n
The example code allows you to generate a unique link to download the file from the server. This link will allow the user to download one time. Also, the link will have an expiration time and it will be expired after the specified expiry date.<\/p>\n
For example, you want to sell an eBook on your website. The eBook is sold on your website for $5, you could use our script to allow that user to download the respective eBook only one-time. The download link will give them a limited number of seconds\/minutes\/hours\/days\/week\/years to claim their download.<\/p>\n
The following process will be followed to implement the temporary download link functionality in PHP<\/b>.<\/p>\n The configuration variables are defined in this file.<\/p>\n In this file, a link will be displayed to navigate to the download link creation file. The authentication password needs to be specified in the query string of the link.<\/p>\n This file creates a temporary download link<\/b> and lists the links on the web page. The query string must have the authentication password and need to be matched with the specified in the \n
Configurations (config.php)<\/h2>\n
\n
$files<\/code> – An array of the files with the unique ID.\n\n
BASE_URL<\/code> – Define the URL of the application.<\/li>\nDOWNLOAD_PATH<\/code> – Define the path of the file downloading script.<\/li>\nTOKEN_DIR<\/code> – Set the token directory path where the keys will be stored.<\/li>\nOAUTH_PASSWORD<\/code> – Set the authentication password to generate a download link.<\/li>\nEXPIRATION_TIME<\/code> – Set a time when the file will expire.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<?php
<\/span>\/\/ Array of the files with an unique ID
<\/span>$files <\/span>= array(
<\/span>'UID12345' <\/span>=> array(
<\/span>'content_type' <\/span>=> <\/span>'application\/zip'<\/span>,
<\/span>'suggested_name' <\/span>=> <\/span>'codex-file.zip'<\/span>,
<\/span>'file_path' <\/span>=> <\/span>'files\/test.zip'<\/span>,
<\/span>'type' <\/span>=> <\/span>'local_file'
<\/span>),
<\/span>'UID67890' <\/span>=> array(
<\/span>'content_type' <\/span>=> <\/span>'audio\/mpeg'<\/span>,
<\/span>'suggested_name' <\/span>=> <\/span>'music-codex.mp3'<\/span>,
<\/span>'file_path' <\/span>=> <\/span>'https:\/\/www.dropbox.com\/XXXXXXX\/song.mp3?dl=1'<\/span>,
<\/span>'type' <\/span>=> <\/span>'remote_file'
<\/span>),
);
<\/span>\/\/ Base URL of the application
<\/span>define<\/span>(<\/span>'BASE_URL'<\/span>,<\/span>'http:\/\/'<\/span>. <\/span>$_SERVER<\/span>[<\/span>'HTTP_HOST'<\/span>].<\/span>'\/'<\/span>);
<\/span>\/\/ Path of the download.php file
<\/span>define<\/span>(<\/span>'DOWNLOAD_PATH'<\/span>, <\/span>BASE_URL<\/span>.<\/span>'download.php'<\/span>);
<\/span>\/\/ Path of the token directory to store keys
<\/span>define<\/span>(<\/span>'TOKEN_DIR'<\/span>, <\/span>'tokens'<\/span>);
<\/span>\/\/ Authentication password to generate download links
<\/span>define<\/span>(<\/span>'OAUTH_PASSWORD'<\/span>,<\/span>'CODEXWORLD'<\/span>);
<\/span>\/\/ Expiration time of the link (examples: +1 year, +1 month, +5 days, +10 hours)
<\/span>define<\/span>(<\/span>'EXPIRATION_TIME'<\/span>, <\/span>'+5 minutes'<\/span>);<\/span><\/pre>\nindex.php<\/h2>\n
<a<\/span> href<\/span>=\"generate.php?CODEXWORLD\"<\/span>><\/span>Generate download link<\/a<\/span>><\/span><\/pre>\nCreate Temporary Download Link (generate.php)<\/h2>\n
config.php<\/code> file, otherwise, 404 error is rendered.<\/p>\n\n
<?php
<\/span>\/\/ Include the configuration file
<\/span>require_once <\/span>'config.php'<\/span>;
<\/span>\/\/ Grab the password from the query string
<\/span>$oauthPass <\/span>= <\/span>trim<\/span>(<\/span>$_SERVER<\/span>[<\/span>'QUERY_STRING'<\/span>]);
<\/span>\/\/ Verify the oauth password
<\/span>if(<\/span>$oauthPass <\/span>!= <\/span>OAUTH_PASSWORD<\/span>){
<\/span>\/\/ Return 404 error, if not a correct path
<\/span>header<\/span>(<\/span>\"HTTP\/1.0 404 Not Found\"<\/span>);
exit;
}else{
<\/span>\/\/ Create a list of links to display the download files
<\/span>$download_links <\/span>= array();
<\/span>\/\/ If the files exist
<\/span>if(<\/span>is_array<\/span>(<\/span>$files<\/span>)){
foreach(<\/span>$files <\/span>as <\/span>$fid <\/span>=> <\/span>$file<\/span>){
<\/span>\/\/ Encode the file ID
<\/span>$fid <\/span>= <\/span>base64_encode<\/span>(<\/span>$fid<\/span>);
<\/span>\/\/ Generate new unique key
<\/span>$key <\/span>= <\/span>uniqid<\/span>(<\/span>time<\/span>().<\/span>'-key'<\/span>,<\/span>TRUE<\/span>);
<\/span>\/\/ Generate download link
<\/span>$download_link <\/span>= <\/span>DOWNLOAD_PATH<\/span>.<\/span>\"?fid=<\/span>$fid<\/span>&key=\"<\/span>.<\/span>$key<\/span>;
<\/span>\/\/ Add download link to the list
<\/span>$download_links<\/span>[] = array(
<\/span>'link' <\/span>=> <\/span>$download_link
<\/span>);
<\/span>\/\/ Create a protected directory to store keys
<\/span>if(!<\/span>is_dir<\/span>(<\/span>TOKEN_DIR<\/span>)) {
<\/span>mkdir<\/span>(<\/span>TOKEN_DIR<\/span>);
<\/span>$file <\/span>= <\/span>fopen<\/span>(<\/span>TOKEN_DIR<\/span>.<\/span>'\/.htaccess'<\/span>,<\/span>'w'<\/span>);
<\/span>fwrite<\/span>(<\/span>$file<\/span>,<\/span>\"Order allow,deny\\nDeny from all\"<\/span>);
<\/span>fclose<\/span>(<\/span>$file<\/span>);
}
<\/span>\/\/ Write the key to the keys list
<\/span>$file <\/span>= <\/span>fopen<\/span>(<\/span>TOKEN_DIR<\/span>.<\/span>'\/keys'<\/span>,<\/span>'a'<\/span>);
<\/span>fwrite<\/span>(<\/span>$file<\/span>, <\/span>\"<\/span>{<\/span>$key<\/span>}<\/span>\\n\"<\/span>);
<\/span>fclose<\/span>(<\/span>$file<\/span>);
}
}
}
<\/span>?><\/span>\r\n\r\n<!-- List all the download links --><\/span>\r\n<?php <\/span>if(!empty(<\/span>$download_links<\/span>)){ <\/span>?>
<\/span> <