URL Cloaking - Business related downloads

[dWhite]

Alright, here's the scenario. I run this business niche blog, and I plan to sell products on the blog. The purchasing button is an encrypted button customized in PayPal merchant section.

After a successful payment, PayPal will redirect the user to wwww.domain.com/downloadfolder/software/index.html for them to be able to direct download it.

I need to mask this, so the URL shows up as www.domain.com but still directs to the page of the item to be downloaded.

Is this possible, and does anyone know how to do it if it is?

 

[nasaboy007]

what you'd have to do is set up your htaccess so that, for example, if you do www.domain.com/product, it'll display www.domain.com/download/software/index.html. i'm not an htaccess expert, so i'll leave that to somebody else, because i dont want to give you the wrong code.

just to warn you, just having the paypal redirect to it isn't secure enough, because then anybody can just grab that link (whether it's masked or not, it'll still have to be unique) and hand it out to others, so they would be able to access it without paying.

what i would do in your case is use paypal's IPN (instant payment notification) system and code it so that it'll only be available as a onetime download, or when paypal alerts your script to a payment, the script sends an email out with a temporary link that expires after x-minutes/hours or after x-downloads.

 

[dWhite]

what i would do in your case is use paypal's IPN (instant payment notification) system and code it so that it'll only be available as a onetime download, or when paypal alerts your script to a payment, the script sends an email out with a temporary link that expires after x-minutes/hours or after x-downloads.

Thanks for the reply.

This is interesting. Where in paypal am I able to do this? This is the first time I've ever dived into the merchant section.

 

[nasaboy007]

www.paypal.com/ipn


there are also various scripts out there that handle paypal IPN, so all you have to do is fill in what you want the script to do if the pyament is verified, and what you want it to do if the payment is fraudelent/still awaiting verification/etc. a quick google will help.

 

[dWhite]

Awesome, thanks for the help!