PHP - Upload image from external server

Question

I'm trying to post a photo to Facebook and it works as long as the image is in the same folder as the PHP script:

  $file= "myimage.png";
    $args = array(
        'message' => 'Photo from application',
        );
      $args[basename($file)] = '@' . realpath($file);
    $ch = curl_init();

What do I need to change to make it work for external images, e.g.:

$file= "http://www.example.com/myimage.png";

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/724391/saving-image-from-php-url-using-php — transilvlad, Jun 11 '13 at 20:28
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/909374/copy-image-from-remote-server-over-http — transilvlad, Jun 11 '13 at 20:29
There I found two answers for you with a single well thought Google search. — transilvlad, Jun 11 '13 at 20:29

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Jun 11 '13 at 20:28

You must first download the image to your server then use that path. Here's an example of downloading the image to a temporary file:

$temp_name = tempnam(sys_get_temp_dir(), "external");
copy($file, $temp_name);
// ...
$args[basename($file)] = '@' . realpath($temp_name);

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 11 '13 at 20:36

1

To be sure file is downloaded without damage I prefer this way.

$path = '/where/to/save/file';
$url = 'http://path.to/file';

$remote = fopen($url, "rb");
if($remote) {
    $local = fopen($path, "wb");
    if($local) {
        while(!feof($remote)) {
            fwrite($local, fread($remote, 1024 * 8 ), 1024 * 8);
        }
    }
}
if ($remote) fclose($remote);
if ($local)  fclose($local);

I recommend using uniqid() to generate the path.

Then pass the path to your code.

Since the file will now be local it should upload just fine.

answered Jun 11 '13 at 20:36

transilvlad

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Hi can you please explain more I'm trying to upload image using your code but I didn't succeed. Thank you – Bynd Apr 04 '19 at 14:22
The code downloads it does not upload. The ticket title is confusing. Uploading files is more complicated since you probably also need to authenticate. – transilvlad Apr 05 '19 at 17:19

PHP - Upload image from external server

2 Answers2