Remote File Existance Problem

Question

Hi, I am creating pdf document for downloading for e.g. someone clicked a PDF link then a pdf is generated and browser opens new window with path of that pdf file. Problem is that browser is giving 404 NOT found error for that file for about 40-50 seconds after its creation but after that when I refresh browser that file is present for viewing or downloading.

one pdf link is http://images.myvouchercodes.co.uk/mvclocal/pdf/ca3b5098-9b35-7d8e.pdf where you can view file but same url gives 404 not found immediately after its creation. I am using following code to write file

      try{
            $fh = fopen($filename, "w");                        
            $contents = $this->render();   // return pdf contents in string        
            if(fwrite($fh, $contents))
            {           
                $fh = fopen($filename, "r");                    
                while(strlen(file_get_contents($filename)) !=  strlen($contents))
                { }
                echo $filename;
            }
            else
            {
                throw new Exception ("Unable to create pdf");
            }
            fclose($fh);

        }
        catch(Exception $e)
        {
            echo $e->getMessage();
        }

That call is ajax and it echos filename upon pdf completion, then this filename is appended to url and the i use window.open() to open new window with pdf link that gives me 404 not found error. Anybody knows why this error is occuring?

Answer 1

First, you need to isolate if it's Zend pdf issue or general webserver one. Try to manually creaty dummy 1-byte file and check if it would show the same delay.

They it's up to your webserver config - some might have aggressive file-system properties caching, so there is no universal answer, you'll need to check corresponding config options.

Answer 2

use php headers for directly outputting pdf on browser

$contents = $this->render();
header('Content-type: application/pdf');
header('Content-disposition: inline; filename=nijman.pdf');
header('Content-length: ' . strlen($contents));
echo $contents;

so instead of doing ajax open new window with url of create pdf code.