Download File to server from URL

Well, this one seems quite simple, and it is. All you have to do to download a file to your server is:

file_put_contents("Tmpfile.zip", file_get_contents("http://someurl/file.zip"));

Only there is one problem. What if you have a large file, like 100mb. Then, you will run out of memory, and not be able to download the file.

What I want is a way to write the file to the disk as I am downloading it. That way, I can download bigger files, without running into memory problems.

Solution 1:

Since PHP 5.1.0, file_put_contents() supports writing piece-by-piece by passing a stream-handle as the $data parameter:

file_put_contents("Tmpfile.zip", fopen("http://someurl/file.zip", 'r'));

From the manual:

If data [that is the second argument] is a stream resource, the remaining buffer of that stream will be copied to the specified file. This is similar with using stream_copy_to_stream().

(Thanks Hakre.)

Solution 2:

private function downloadFile($url, $path)
{
    $newfname = $path;
    $file = fopen ($url, 'rb');
    if ($file) {
        $newf = fopen ($newfname, 'wb');
        if ($newf) {
            while(!feof($file)) {
                fwrite($newf, fread($file, 1024 * 8), 1024 * 8);
            }
        }
    }
    if ($file) {
        fclose($file);
    }
    if ($newf) {
        fclose($newf);
    }
}

Solution 3:

Try using cURL

set_time_limit(0); // unlimited max execution time
$options = array(
  CURLOPT_FILE    => '/path/to/download/the/file/to.zip',
  CURLOPT_TIMEOUT =>  28800, // set this to 8 hours so we dont timeout on big files
  CURLOPT_URL     => 'http://remoteserver.com/path/to/big/file.zip',
);

$ch = curl_init();
curl_setopt_array($ch, $options);
curl_exec($ch);
curl_close($ch);

I'm not sure but I believe with the CURLOPT_FILE option it writes as it pulls the data, ie. not buffered.

Solution 4:

prodigitalson's answer didn't work for me. I got missing fopen in CURLOPT_FILE more details.

This worked for me, including local urls:

function downloadUrlToFile($url, $outFileName)
{   
    if(is_file($url)) {
        copy($url, $outFileName); 
    } else {
        $options = array(
          CURLOPT_FILE    => fopen($outFileName, 'w'),
          CURLOPT_TIMEOUT =>  28800, // set this to 8 hours so we dont timeout on big files
          CURLOPT_URL     => $url
        );

        $ch = curl_init();
        curl_setopt_array($ch, $options);
        curl_exec($ch);
        $httpcode = curl_getinfo($ch, CURLINFO_HTTP_CODE);
        curl_close($ch);
        return $httpcode;
    }
}