I want people to view PowerPoint presentations (in read only format in .pdf), then if they like them, the fill out a small form and get permission to download the real thing in .ppxt. Do I simply link to a .pptx file in my public_ftp folder and then it automatically downloads to their PC? Or how?

matt w.

I wouldn't suggest linking directly to a publicly accessible file. If you do that, people you don't want to have access to the file might get access to it. What I would do is place the PPT file outside of your web root and read it in after verifying they were referred after filling in the form. Make sure you send the appropriate header from the page.

PHP Code:

<?php
header("Content-type: application/powerpoint");   
echo file_get_contents("../somefile.pptx");
?>

If you will forgive a newbie mistake, where exactly is outside my web root directory?

Anywhere. If you have a folder called 'public_html' or 'www'.. just make sure it's not within that folder. Your ftp folder is probably fine. Alternatively, you could just create a folder in your standard public_html folder and place an .htaccess file in it to restrict access. (http://httpd.apache.org/docs/1.3/howto/htaccess.html for your reference)

Use Nick's code to allow users to view the file -- you'll have to figure out authentication though first if it matters, which I assume it does

Also, if you want to force a download screen:

PHP Code:

header('Content-Length: $size_of_file');
header('Content-Disposition: attachment;filename="$filename.pdf"');