Using Send_File to a Remote Source (Ruby on Rails)

Question

In my app, I have a requirement that is stumping me.

I have a file stored in S3, and when a user clicks on a link in my app, I log in the DB they\'ve clicked the lin

Answer 1

You can read the file from S3 and write it locally to a non-public directory, then use X-Sendfile (apache) or X-Accel-Redirect (nginx) to serve the content.

For nginx you would include something like the following in your config:

            location /private {
                                 internal;
                                 alias /path/to/private/directory/;
            }

Then in your rails controller, you do the following:

   response.headers['Content-Type'] = your_content_type
   response.headers['Content-Disposition'] = "attachment; filename=#{your_file_name}"
   response.headers['Cache-Control'] =  "private"
   response.headers['X-Accel-Redirect'] = path_to_your_file
   render :nothing=>true

A good writeup of the process is here