Upload zip files to service for user download - node.js

Question

I have an express (node.js) application that creates mp3 files for a user and stores them in a folder on the server.
The server's file structure looks like this:
data/
id#/
song1.mp3
song2.mp3
song3.mp3
id#/
song1.mp3
song2.mp3
song3.mp3
...
I want to create zip files and download links for the folder and email users their zip file. Each folder is named using an id# and corresponds to a user.
I want to use an external service (such as s3) to store and handle the downloads of the files.
How would I zip up the files and send them to the service and create download links? Which services should I look into?

Answer 1

you can use the child_process module to run a zip command in the background (this example is for say if you're on Linux, you can modify it to suit windows)
This just handles the zip process, then you can respond with the link to download the file:
var exec = require('child_process').exec;
var currentWorkingDirectory = '/data', // Folder that contains the sub folders of id#/
folderToZip = 'id123123', // Subfolder name id#, e.g. id123123
tmpFolderForZips = '/tmp/', // Folder to store the zip files in
execString = "zip -r " + tmpFolderForZips + folderToZip + ".zip " + folderToZip; // Tidy string to put it all together
console.log(execString);
var child = exec(execString, { cwd: currentWorkingDirectory });
child.on('error', function(err) {
console.log(err);
})
child.on('close', function() {
// respond with download link to zip file
console.log('Done Zipping');
});
Make sure you apt-get install zip