[FX.php List] [OFF] Restricting web directory/downloads via FM?

[Kevin Futter]

I have a forthcoming need to do something similar to this too, so I
appreciate your response here Leo. Any additional info would also be
appreciated!

Kev

On 29/07/10 8:20 AM, "Leo R. Lundgren" <leo at finalresort.org> wrote:

> Did you Google any of this? There's a ton of information out there on this
> essential functionality.
>
> There are many ways to do it. First of all you need the authentication, which
> you can do upon request, firing a query to the database, or by caching
> information so you don't need a trip to the database for each request.
>
> Then you need a way to protect the files. The obvious solution is to have them
> placed in a directory that is not directly accessible from the web (for
> example by having a "deny from all" in Apache's rules, which could be in a
> .htaccess, or some equivalent measure in other web servers).
>
> Then to bind this together you could write a script that processes the request
> and readfile()'s the requested file if it exists and the user provided valid
> credentials. If the files are big readfile() might not be that fun to use
> since it literally relays the entire file using PHP, but there are other ways
> to do it in that case. One example is to make the web server protect the files
> by asking your PHP script for authentication, and if the auth succeeds the web
> server sends the file instead of PHP, which is more effective.
>
> The readfile() method probably works as a start though, depending on your file
> sizes and the number of requests you'll get. As you say its PDF files I
> suppose they won't be that huge :)
>
> -|
>
> 29 jul 2010 kl. 00.03 skrev Joel Shapiro:
>
>> Hi all
>>
>> I've got a new client that would like to make some downloadable materials
>> (mostly PDFs) available to their authorized users.  The client would like to
>> be able to upload files to some directory on their site and have only
>> logged-in users (authenticated via FMP "users" table) be able to view and/or
>> download them.
>>
>> Anybody have any thoughts on the best & simplest way to do this?  (or are
>> best and simplest mutually exclusive? ;)
>>
>> I've thought of giving the client access to edit an html page with links to
>> each of the downloadable files -- and I'd make that page accessible only to
>> logged in users.  Are there easy ways to avoid having the client have to
>> update html and hrefs?
>
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--
Kevin Futter
Webmaster, St. Bernard's College
http://www.sbc.vic.edu.au/

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