Module | ActionController::Streaming |
In: |
lib/action_controller/metal/streaming.rb
|
Methods for sending arbitrary data and for streaming files to the browser, instead of rendering.
DEFAULT_SEND_FILE_OPTIONS | = | { :type => 'application/octet-stream'.freeze, :disposition => 'attachment'.freeze, }.freeze |
Sends the given binary data to the browser. This method is similar to render :text => data, but also allows you to specify whether the browser should display the response as a file attachment (i.e. in a download dialog) or as inline data. You may also set the content type, the apparent file name, and other things.
Options:
Generic data download:
send_data buffer
Download a dynamically-generated tarball:
send_data generate_tgz('dir'), :filename => 'dir.tgz'
Display an image Active Record in the browser:
send_data image.data, :type => image.content_type, :disposition => 'inline'
See send_file for more information on HTTP Content-* headers and caching.
Tip: if you want to stream large amounts of on-the-fly generated data to the browser, then use render :text => proc { … } instead. See ActionController::Base#render for more information.
Sends the file. This uses a server-appropriate method (such as X-Sendfile) via the Rack::Sendfile middleware. The header to use is set via config.action_dispatch.x_sendfile_header, and defaults to "X-Sendfile". Your server can also configure this for you by setting the X-Sendfile-Type header.
Be careful to sanitize the path parameter if it is coming from a web page. send_file(params[:path]) allows a malicious user to download any file on your server.
Options:
The default Content-Type and Content-Disposition headers are set to download arbitrary binary files in as many browsers as possible. IE versions 4, 5, 5.5, and 6 are all known to have a variety of quirks (especially when downloading over SSL).
Simple download:
send_file '/path/to.zip'
Show a JPEG in the browser:
send_file '/path/to.jpeg', :type => 'image/jpeg', :disposition => 'inline'
Show a 404 page in the browser:
send_file '/path/to/404.html', :type => 'text/html; charset=utf-8', :status => 404
Read about the other Content-* HTTP headers if you‘d like to provide the user with more information (such as Content-Description) in www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616-sec14.html#sec14.11.
Also be aware that the document may be cached by proxies and browsers. The Pragma and Cache-Control headers declare how the file may be cached by intermediaries. They default to require clients to validate with the server before releasing cached responses. See www.mnot.net/cache_docs/ for an overview of web caching and www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616-sec14.html#sec14.9 for the Cache-Control header spec.