Force download a file from browser using php - php

Question

I have generated csv file on link click. But I am unable to download file from browser.
Here is my code.
$filename="Payment_Received.csv";
header( 'Content-Description: File Transfer' );
header( 'Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=' . $filename );
header('Content-Type: text/csv; charset=UTF-8');
print_r($output);
// output is string comma separated if i remove die and then execute
// then csv append html data also, so I keep die
ob_flush();
die();
CSV is downloading but for it is with no content.
Please help me out.

Answer 1

If your script outputs this: "1","asd","asds" \n "2","sqda","asds", I believe you will have a hard time generating .csv from that my friend. For CSV output, make sure your data is quoted and escaped properly, I'm sorry to send you to php.net but this comment is the only example I could land that mentions clearly at this issue. There are some code examples on that page for csv output.
Good-luck

Answer 2

Function to force download a file from browser.
function output_file($file, $name, $mime_type='')
{
/*
This function takes a path to a file to output ($file),
the filename that the browser will see ($name) and
the MIME type of the file ($mime_type, optional).
If you want to do something on download abort/finish,
register_shutdown_function('function_name');
*/
if(!is_readable($file)) die('File not found or inaccessible!');
$size = filesize($file);
$name = rawurldecode($name);
/* Figure out the MIME type (if not specified) */
$known_mime_types=array(
"pdf" => "application/pdf",
"txt" => "text/plain",
"html" => "text/html",
"htm" => "text/html",
"exe" => "application/octet-stream",
"zip" => "application/zip",
"doc" => "application/msword",
"xls" => "application/vnd.ms-excel",
"ppt" => "application/vnd.ms-powerpoint",
"gif" => "image/gif",
"png" => "image/png",
"jpeg"=> "image/jpg",
"jpg" => "image/jpg",
"php" => "text/plain"
);
if($mime_type==''){
$file_extension = strtolower(substr(strrchr($file,"."),1));
if(array_key_exists($file_extension, $known_mime_types)){
$mime_type=$known_mime_types[$file_extension];
} else {
$mime_type="application/force-download";
};
};
#ob_end_clean(); //turn off output buffering to decrease cpu usage
// required for IE, otherwise Content-Disposition may be ignored
if(ini_get('zlib.output_compression'))
ini_set('zlib.output_compression', 'Off');
header('Content-Type: ' . $mime_type);
header('Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="'.$name.'"');
header("Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary");
header('Accept-Ranges: bytes');
/* The three lines below basically make the
download non-cacheable */
header("Cache-control: private");
header('Pragma: private');
header("Expires: Mon, 26 Jul 1997 05:00:00 GMT");
// multipart-download and download resuming support
if(isset($_SERVER['HTTP_RANGE']))
{
list($a, $range) = explode("=",$_SERVER['HTTP_RANGE'],2);
list($range) = explode(",",$range,2);
list($range, $range_end) = explode("-", $range);
$range=intval($range);
if(!$range_end) {
$range_end=$size-1;
} else {
$range_end=intval($range_end);
}
$new_length = $range_end-$range+1;
header("HTTP/1.1 206 Partial Content");
header("Content-Length: $new_length");
header("Content-Range: bytes $range-$range_end/$size");
} else {
$new_length=$size;
header("Content-Length: ".$size);
}
/* output the file itself */
$chunksize = 1*(1024*1024); //you may want to change this
$bytes_send = 0;
if ($file = fopen($file, 'r'))
{
if(isset($_SERVER['HTTP_RANGE']))
fseek($file, $range);
while(!feof($file) &&
(!connection_aborted()) &&
($bytes_send<$new_length)
)
{
$buffer = fread($file, $chunksize);
print($buffer); //echo($buffer); // is also possible
flush();
$bytes_send += strlen($buffer);
}
fclose($file);
} else die('Error - can not open file.');
die();
}
/*********************************************
Example of use
**********************************************/
/*
Make sure script execution doesn't time out.
Set maximum execution time in seconds (0 means no limit).
*/
set_time_limit(0);
$file_path='that_one_file.txt';
output_file($file_path, 'some file.txt', 'text/plain');
Please check code at:
http://w-shadow.com/blog/2007/08/12/how-to-force-file-download-with-php/