Downloading a file using PHP

[wibble99]

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Hopefully this is a simple question for anyone that knows PHP - how do I write a simple PHP program that will download a zip file from a specified URL and write it to my server?

Affiliate Window allows you to easily download the product feed of a merchant by entering an URL in your browser. You're then asked where on your PC you want to save the zip file.

But I want to do this on my server and have a bit of PHP code that will copy the zip file from the AffiliateWindow URL to a local file.

Anyone able to give me a quick solution to this?

[Jeff]

Do you have to use php?

The easiest way would be just to run it as a shell script on your server, and use wget to fetch the file. You could automate this by running it as a cron job.

Would make it easier for us if AW allowed us to download ALL the product feeds in one file, like CJ do, it can be a PITA trying to keep track of so many files.

[Rich]

This is what I use (but not for Awin feeds, yet)

exec("curl -o myfilename.zip httd:remoteserver.com/theirfilename.zip"); 

That just saves it into the same folder as the php script with the name myfilename.zip. (change the httd: to http://, had to do it to stop the board making a link)

I then use the PclZip php library to handle extracting files - there could well be easier ways.

[wibble99]

I don't really need to use PHP, but as I needed to then do things with the file afterwards I thought I may as well use it if possible and keep everything in one program. I didn't know about wget, so that was useful.

While searching for info on wget I also saw talk of cURL. I've not read enough you to see what the difference is but the PHP Rich has provided looks like it's just what I need so I'll give that a test first and see what happens.

Thanks for your help, it's going to save me a lot of time!

[Aquanuke]

You could do a simple cron job that does something like this..

cd /home/www/html/website/
wget http://domain.com/file.zip
unzip file.zip

That basically changes into your working directory, grabs the zip, and unzips it into the current directory.

You need unzip if its not on your server.
http://rpmfind.net/linux/rpm2html/se...mit=Search+...

Nothing fancy, but a simple way to do the job.

[matbennett]

Just leaving for the day now, but I have script that does this with Awin feeds already. It's a bit rough, but it works.

PM me as a reminder and I'll send it over.

[rogerlittin]

Ive got a couple of http client classes that I use for downloading csv files etc.

PM me with your email if you want and I can send them over.

Roger.

[matbennett]

OK, this one is a bit rough and ready, but it does work. I knocked it together just before Xmas as reading this forum for a couple of month's has persuaded me to try things from the Affiliate end in my "spare" time again.

I've stripped out a lot of the stuff specific to my setup and added comments in. This version deals with the uncompressed files, rather than zips as the server I have it on cannot uncompress zips:

<?php
// simple Awin feed saver by MatBennett
// save as awingrabber.php (or anything) & call using :
// awingrabber.php?mid=XXX where XXX is the required merchant ID

// change these for your username & password
$userName = "USERNAME";
$userPass = "PASSWORD";

// define locations
$file = 'http://products.affiliatewindow.com/csvproductoutput.php?mid='.$mid.'&user='.$userName.'&password='.$userPass.'&nozip=1';
$destination = 'raw/data'.$mid.'.csv'; // change this for relative path to your desired server location

// retrieve & save the zip file
$fp = fopen($file,"r");
$fp2 = fopen("$destination", "w");
while (!feof($fp)) {
    $buf = fread($fp, 1024);
    fwrite($fp2, $buf);
}
fclose($fp);
fclose($fp2);

// file will now be saved as: raw/dataXXX.csv where XXX is the merchant ID

?>

This is very simple and just saves the file to your local server. The version that I use cycles through an array of defined merchants then puts the CSV files into a database, but I thought it probably more useful to provide a "stripped down" version.

Don't forget to CHMOD 777 the target directory. Hope that it helps.

[999gi]

Does anyone know what the following error means

Basically Im running an fopen to try to get files of about 1MB=2MB from a network server
My host has max_file_size set to 8MB

Warning: fopen("ftp://...@aftp.linksynergy.com/1623_678251_mp.txt.gz", "r") - Success

If I Cut and paste the ftp address into my browser the file downloads no problem so its not that.

[matbennett]

Some hosts don't allow fopen to run. I *think* this gives a similar error.

[999gi]

Thanks

Yes I think it is permissions related (which an area I know even less about).

I have got stuff working with other networks so its not the hosts fault, so im thinking it must be something like this networks firewall.

Since I moved from using ASP to php Ive found that the one big thing that bugs me is that their error messages are much more vague - which considering the number of errors I generate is a real pain.