Forbidden error when downloading purchased digital products.

[HaHo]

Hi,
Hope this is in the right place, my 1st post so here goes.

I've just set up a site from which I'll be selling fitness products as digital downloads (pdfs and zipped video files).

I'm at the stage of testing the site, and have a few mock products. Everything seems to be working, except when I buy a product, and I'm returned back to ZC from PayPal, I click the 'Download' link and I'm gived a Forbidden "You don't have permission to access /store/pub/.vbrhipwjgmhxsyx/_completebody.zip on this server." message.

The file in this example is called "completebody.zip and is in the downloads folder. I linked the file to a product using attributes as per the tutorials I found on this site & forum.

Any ideas where I've messed up?

Thanks

[Ajeh]

Make sure that /pub is set to 777 ...

(Zen Cart supplies the files to your customers from files/folders built inside the /pub folder dynamically built on-the-fly when your customer goes to do their download. It links the /pub files to the masters in the /download area. It doesn't give customers direct access to the /download folder ... for security reasons.)

[HaHo]

Thanks for the fast reply,

I've done that, but I'm still getting the same message:
"You don't have permission to access /store/pub/.wglewnegtkfxsgqyvp/complete.zip on this server.

Additionally, a 403 Forbidden error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request."

Anything else that could be causing this? or anyother files I need to change the permissions of?

[Ajeh]

If could be your server does not allow for the symbolic link in the .htaccess in /pub

#prevent directory browsing -- for security
IndexIgnore */*

Options +FollowSymLinks -Indexes

Check with your hosting site ...

Note: windows servers cannot use Redirect on the Downloads ...

unix servers that are unable to recognize the symbolic links cannot use the Redirect either ...

First try a tiny file of 100k ... does it work?

Next try a file of 1meg ... does it work?

Now try a file over 2meg ... does it work or break?

[HaHo]

Got it,

I just tried it on another installation that's hosted by a different company. And it worked first time... So I think it looks like it's a server issue.

Thanks for your help.

[john.white]

I had this same issue. I figured out what it is. I had

<Directory /home/www/*/>
Options -FollowSymLinks -Indexes
</Directory>

in apache2.conf. I commented these lines out and restarted apache, and it worked fine. These lines prevents directory listing. Is there a way to leave these lines in the apache2.conf file and override at the directory level? Thanks.

John