Express – 从外部 URL 下载文件

Question

I have a file stored on an external server. I want to be able to call GET request to my own NodeJS server (using express ). What I'm currently doing is almost OK, but it does not trigger browser to download the file (no browser UI for the download is shown):

const express = require('express');

const app = express();

app.get('/download-file', (req, res) => {
  const externalRequest = http.request({
    hostname: 'my.external-server.com',
    path: '/my/path/my-file.zip',
  }, (externalRes) => {
    res.setHeader('Content-Disposition', 'attachment; filename="MyFile.zip"');
    externalRes.pipe(res);
  });
  return externalRequest.end();
});

app.listen(8080, () => console.log('Server is listening'));

What am I missing here? I see that triggering a GET request to localhost:8080/download-file is actually fetching it, but no UI for download is shown.

Answer 1

This is the code that is running in one of my pet projects, hope it helps.

It pipes the download request ok, but there is no size info for the download, so it becames one of that downloads that you dont know when will finish.

const http = require('http')

app.get('/down_file/:file_name', (req, res) => {

    const fileName = req.params.file_name
    const url = "http://externalUrl/" + fileName

    var externalReq = http.request(url, function(externalRes) {
        res.setHeader("content-disposition", "attachment; filename=" + fileName);
        externalRes.pipe(res);
    });
    externalReq.end();
})