In what ways can small changes in a PHP script impact the functionality of downloading files, and how can they be effectively debugged?

Small changes in a PHP script can impact the functionality of downloading files by causing errors in the file handling process, such as incorrect file paths, headers not being set properly, or encoding issues. To effectively debug these issues, it is important to carefully review the code for any recent changes, check for typos or syntax errors, and use debugging tools like var_dump() or error_log() to identify the root cause of the problem. 

<?php
$file = 'example.pdf';

if (file_exists($file)) {
    header('Content-Description: File Transfer');
    header('Content-Type: application/pdf');
    header('Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=' . basename($file));
    header('Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary');
    header('Expires: 0');
    header('Cache-Control: must-revalidate');
    header('Pragma: public');
    header('Content-Length: ' . filesize($file));
    ob_clean();
    flush();
    readfile($file);
    exit;
} else {
    echo 'File not found.';
}
?>

Keywords

PHP script file download debugging impact functionality

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