Managing uploaded files in Laravel - linking public and storage directories - php

Question

In my Laravel 5.1 app, I'm storing images in storage/app/uploads folder.
My local disk:
<?php
'disks' => [
'local' => [
'driver' => 'local',
'root' => storage_path('app/uploads'),
],
// other configuration...
?>
Thing is, I can't figure out a way to use the image files after they're uploaded, e.g. as the source of <img> tag. Basically, I need to retrieve a valid path to an image, so it can be used on the page.
For deployment I'm using Envoyer which provides a solution. According to Envoyer docs:
When storing user uploaded files, you should store them in the storage directory of your application if you are using Laravel. Then, you may use the "Manage Linked Folders" feature of Envoyer to create a symbolic link from your public directory to the storage directory. The "Manage Linked Folders" button can be found on the "Deployment Hooks" tab of your project.
..and this is clear.
But how do I "link" the storage and public folders in my local development environment? Does Laravel provide a way to do it, or do I need to create a symbolic link in my environment manually?

Answer 1

There are a few options:
Create a controller that would output the files
class AssetController {
public function show($id) {
$file = File::findOrFail($id);
return Response::make(Storage::get($file->storage_key), 200, ['Content-Type' => $file->mime_type]);
}
}
Create a symlink public/assets => storage/app/
Upload files to public/assets instead of storage/app
Use rewrites on your web server to serve the files from your storage/app folder - how to do that depends on what webserver you are using. For nginx you could use something like
rewrite ^/v1/assets/(\d+) /../storage/app/$1;