Symfony2 - Force file download - php

Question

I'm trying to download a file when a user clicks on download link.
In Controller:
$response = new Response();
$response->headers->set('Content-type', 'application/octect-stream');
$response->headers->set('Content-Disposition', sprintf('attachment; filename="%s"', $filename));
$response->headers->set('Content-Length', filesize($filename));
return $response;
This is opening the dialog box to save the file, but it says the file is 0 bytes.
And changing it to:
$response = new Response();
$response->headers->set('Content-type', 'application/octect-stream');
$response->headers->set('Content-Disposition', sprintf('attachment; filename="%s"', $filename));
$response->headers->set('Content-Length', filesize($filename));
$response->headers->set('Content-Transfer-Encoding', 'binary');
$response->setContent(readfile($filename));
return $response;
I get a bunch of weird characters instead of the file download dialog box.
Finally, switching the "setContent" line to:
$response->setContent(file_get_contents($filename));
It returns a PHP error:
Fatal error: Allowed memory size...
Any clues on how to achieve this?
I've done it before in PHP (wihtout MVC), but I don't know what can be missing to do it through Symfony2...
Maybe the solution is setting the memory_limit in PHP.INI, but I guess it´s not the best practice...

Answer 1

The most comfortable solution is
use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\BinaryFileResponse;
use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\ResponseHeaderBag;
$response = new BinaryFileResponse($file);
$response->setContentDisposition(ResponseHeaderBag::DISPOSITION_ATTACHMENT);
return $response;

Answer 2

I finally solved this without X-SendFile (which is probably the best practice). Anyway, for those who can't get X-Sendfile apache module to work (shared hosting), here's a solution:
// Generate response
$response = new Response();
// Set headers
$response->headers->set('Cache-Control', 'private');
$response->headers->set('Content-type', mime_content_type($filename));
$response->headers->set('Content-Disposition', 'attachment; filename="' . basename($filename) . '";');
$response->headers->set('Content-length', filesize($filename));
// Send headers before outputting anything
$response->sendHeaders();
$response->setContent(file_get_contents($filename));
return $response;

Answer 3

You shouldn't use PHP for downloading files because it's a task for an Apache or Nginx server. Best option is to use X-Accel-Redirect (in case of Nginx) / X-Sendfile (in case of Apache) headers for file downloading.
Following action snippet can be used with configured Nginx to download files from Symfony2:
return new Response('', 200, array('X-Accel-Redirect' => $filename));
UPD1: Code for apache with configured mod_xsendfile:
return new Response('', 200, array(
'X-Sendfile' => $filename,
'Content-type' => 'application/octet-stream',
'Content-Disposition' => sprintf('attachment; filename="%s"', $filename))
);

Answer 4

As of Symfony 3.2 you can use the file() controller helper which is a shortcut for creating a BinaryFileResponse as mentioned in a previous answer:
public function fileAction()
{
// send the file contents and force the browser to download it
return $this->file('/path/to/some_file.pdf');
}

Answer 5

Don't know if it can help but it's application/octet-stream not application/octect-stream

Answer 6

+1 for alexander response.
But if you can't use X-Sendfile, you should use the BinaryFileResponse added in the 2.2: http://symfony.com/doc/current/components/http_foundation/introduction.html#serving-files
In my project the result is
$response = new \Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\BinaryFileResponse($dir .DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR. $zipName);
$d = $response->headers->makeDisposition(
ResponseHeaderBag::DISPOSITION_ATTACHMENT,
$zipName
);
$response->headers->set('Content-Disposition', $d);
return $response;

Answer 7

For those who don't have the option of setting headers:
The download attribute may help depending on which browsers you need to support:
<a href="{file url}" download>
or
<a href="{file url}" download="{a different file name}">
This is not supported in all legacy browsers. See this page for browser support:
https://www.w3schools.com/tags/att_a_download.asp