File Download

1. If you use Storage::download(), it would be saving to your server and only after, your code has to perform the pass through download with readfile(), i.e. the entire file is not read into your memory, instead, bit by bit for a low resource approach to sending big files.

2. To do pass through download from S3, you will have to call the temporaryUrl() and do a readfile() on the temporary URL.

3. https://laravel.com/docs/8.x/filesystem#file-urls The temporary URLs can be made to expire in X minutes, this should be sufficient if you are not overly concerned about link sharing, i.e. the download is not a paid product etc

4. #1 is pointless, furthermore if it is a big file, you can imagine nothing will happen at the downloader's side until the file has been transferred to your server.

5. #2 gives you the best security/control such as single download only etc especially if it is a paid product, it will take up some resources, but that's the price required. I think there are easier ways to protect a paid product such as requiring another small download to "activate" this download.

6. #3 is redirecting the downloader to the S3's temporary URL, which will expire in X minutes. It will not tax your server. Since it expires, leechers cannot abuse the temporary link by posting it all over the internet.

7. I would say go for #3.

Thanks for the reply. In #3 you suggest, this is how I implemented it and it seems to work great (for amazon s3).

public function download($path, $filename)
    {

// $path = "some/path/to/file";
// $filename = "foo.mp4"; // the filename that will be downloaded on the customers computer

return redirect(Storage::cloud()->temporaryUrl(
                $path,
                now()->addHour(),
                ['ResponseContentDisposition' => 'attachment; filename ="' . $filename . '"']
            ));
}