Skip to main content
carolyn@10541
carolyn@10541
Known Participant
May 7, 2017
Answered

Digital Downloads [How to set up digital PDF files for download after purchase?]

  • May 7, 2017
  • 2 replies
  • 1570 views

i am creating an ecommerce website in Adobe Dreamweaver Bootstrap with digital downloads. I am fine creating the website, however, does anyone know how to set up digital pdf files on an ecommerce website that can be downloaded after purchasing the file? My client also,wants to limit the number of downloads to one.

Thank you.

This topic has been closed for replies.
Correct answer Nancy OShea

I built a digital media delivery system integrated with a 3rd party shopping cart.

After customers complete their credit card transaction on the PCI compliant shopping cart, they are redirected to a download page on our servers that gets created dynamically with PHP code.  The links contain heavily encrypted code to digital product(s) hosted on outside servers that are NOT publicly accessible.  In other words, to download the files you must have the secret sauce or it won't work.  Any attempts to share links with other people will fail because the downloads must originate from our servers. 

As a fallback, customers also get an auto generated email with the download links.  They have 3 days to complete their downloads after which the links are auto disabled.

This system contains many server-side & client side scripts.  If you are a skilled coder, it's doable.  If not, you may need to outsource this to a 3rd party.   Start with your shopping cart as they may already have solutions available for you to use.

Good luck!

Nancy

2 replies

O
osgood_
Legend
May 7, 2017

carolyn@10541  wrote

i am creating an ecommerce website in Adobe Dreamweaver Bootstrap with digital downloads. I am fine creating the website, however, does anyone know how to set up digital pdf files on an ecommerce website that can be downloaded after purchasing the file? My client also,wants to limit the number of downloads to one.

Thank you.

There's plenty of information available about using Paypal digital downloads on youtube which should be helpful

Search for:

digital download using paypal

Rob Hecker2
Rob Hecker2
Legend
May 7, 2017

I believe PayPal has a process for selling and delivering digital media that does not require you to do any programming. You should look into that.

If you don't use a canned solution, like the PayPal one, then you will have to do some back end coding with a language like PHP. You must process credit card payment and forward the buyer to the download process only if payment was successful. The download process must be protected from unauthorized downloading. So unless you are a good PHP coder, you really want to use a canned solution.

The problem with a canned solution is that it may not provide the process exactly the way the client envisions it. It also probably won't seamlessly integrate with the design of the website. So compromises would have to be made.

O
osgood_
Legend
May 7, 2017

https://forums.adobe.com/people/Rob+Hecker2  wrote

The problem with a canned solution is that it may not provide the process exactly the way the client envisions it. It also probably won't seamlessly integrate with the design of the website. So compromises would have to be made.

For anything decent this can get pretty tricky as you start to drill down into what is required to protect the download and maybe send the user to different pages/products based on what is purchased. I don't know if Paypals canned solution can even protect a download page other than to bury it knee deep in a folder and hope no one happens to come upon it and then what if the nice buyer decides it would be fun to share that download url on a public forum or even upload the pdf for download..........hummmm. I guess there's only so much you can do to protect a digital download and its a matter of how far do you go to protect it and is it worth the extra work, which ultimately will end in failure if the buyer is hell bent on freely sharing it.

I've never tried it but I suppose Paypal IPN would be an option as you can show the download link AFTER the payment has been made.

if(payment == complete) {

Do stuff here if payment has been made.

}

You can only have one IPN though so the bit of code might get complex if you want to show specific download links for specific products which have been purchased

if($_POST['item_name'] == "My big red book")) {

echo "<a href="digital_products/my_big_red_book.zip">Download Link</a>"

}

if($_POST['item_name'] == "My big green book")) {

echo "<a href="digital_products/my_big_green_book.zip">Download Link</a>"

}

Just saying, done correctly there's a bit more to it than might initially be thought, unless you want to take the 'cheap' way out.

pziecina
pziecina
Legend
May 7, 2017

There is a w3c specification, and an api to use for digital rights managment, (drm) but as with many of such items they require more knowledge than the avarage Dw user is accredited with, so Dw has no support.

If it is for a text document(s) then the Adobe digital rights managment api, (for digital editions) as used by many e-readers may be worth looking at, but again a good working knowledge of javascript, and a server side method of processing payments is required.

read - http://electricbookworks.com/kb/simple-ebook-operational-issues/adobe-drm-a-guide-for-publishers/

Terms & ConditionsAccessibility statement
Using the community Terms of use Privacy Cookie preferences Do not sell or share my personal information ad choicesAdChoices