Zip multiple database PDF blob files - php

Question

I have a database table that contains numerous PDF blob files. I am attempting to combine all of the files into a single ZIP file that I can download and then print.
Please help!
<?php
include '../config.php';
include '../connect.php';
$session = $_GET['session'];
$query = "SELECT $tbl_uploads.username, $tbl_uploads.description,
$tbl_uploads.type, $tbl_uploads.size, $tbl_uploads.content,
$tbl_members.session
FROM $tbl_uploads
LEFT JOIN $tbl_members
ON $tbl_uploads.username = $tbl_members.username
WHERE $tbl_members.session = '$session'";
$result = mysql_query($query) or die('Error, query failed');
$files = array();
while(list($username, $description, $type, $size, $content) =
mysql_fetch_array($result)) {
$files[] = "$username-$description.pdf";
}
$zip = new ZipArchive;
$zip->open('file.zip', ZipArchive::CREATE);
foreach ($files as $file) {
$zip->addFile($file);
}
$zip->close();
header('Content-Type: application/zip');
header('Content-disposition: attachment; filename=filename.zip');
header('Content-Length: ' . filesize($zipfilename));
readfile($zipname);
exit();
?>

Answer 1

Your PDF data is stored in the database in BLOB fields, I don't see you putting this data in a file. So your ZIP will not contain any files because you don't add real existing files to it.
This is what you are currently doing:
Reading your data from the database
Creating an array of filenames
Creating a ZIP of filenames that might not exist
This what you should do:
Reading your data from the database
Creating an array of filenames
Write your BLOB data into that files
Creating a ZIP of files that exist
Example:
$files = array();
while(list($username, $description, $type, $size, $content) =
mysql_fetch_array($result)) {
$files[] = "$username-$description.pdf";
// write the BLOB Content to the file
if ( file_put_contents("$username-$description.pdf", $content) === FALSE ) {
echo "Could not write PDF File";
}
}
What you should do if that works for you:
Write the files in a temporary folder (maybe with some help of http://php.net/tempnam) somewhere else and maybe remove them after your archiving process.
There is also a second problem in your code, you use $zipfilename for calculating the content-length and $zipname to read the file and no variable to create the zip. Since $zipfilename and $zipname is not defined, this won't work.
You should define $zipfilename with a ZIP filename and also use that same variable when creating the zip file.
Example:
// a temp filename containing the current unix timestamp
$zipfilename = 'temp_' . time() . '.zip';
$zip->open($zipfilename, ZipArchive::CREATE);
foreach ($files as $file) {
$zip->addFile($file);
}
$zip->close();
header('Content-Type: application/zip');
header('Content-disposition: attachment; filename=filename.zip');
header('Content-Length: ' . filesize($zipfilename));
readfile($zipfilename);

Answer 2

pdftk will merge multiple PDF files, as well as PDFsam..