# Everyone Uploads, Restricted Downloads



## rixtertrader (May 1, 2013)

I'm not sure if I'm asking this in the correct section of the forum. If not, I apologize.

At our company, we have several restaurants. Each week, the manager of each restaurant has to PRINT to paper a report and then have it delivered to our home office.

This is inefficient in my opinion.

I'm proposing that they print to PDF instead, and that this be uploaded to the CLOUD where only those with proper clearance can download the PDF's here at the main office.

While I can easily setup the PDF printing, I'm not sure how to setup in the cloud a place where EVERYONE can upload their files, but restrict those who can download.

Any suggestions? Services? etc.?

TIA


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## wmorri (May 29, 2008)

Hi,

Welcome to TSF!!

This makes a lot of sense. It is nice to see that you are thinking forward, for not only yourself but for your employer, too.

Setting up hosting is pretty simple in this day and age. Just about anyone can get some hosting whether it is in the cloud, or a shared hosting plan. Either will work for you. As for the second part of your idea, there are a couple of options. One is to have your resturant managers upload to an FTP server. Then have your home office people download the reports. 

However, I have a better idea. I think with a little work and a little time, you could set up a simple uploader on the hosting that allows the managers to upload the pdf to the cloud and then have it either be able to be downloaded by the home office. Or the pdf could be emailed to the right people. I can do a little research into this as well, and ask some of my colleagues for their thoughts.


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## rixtertrader (May 1, 2013)

Hello wmorri,

thanks for your reply.

We have a website presence already. What we also have are managers that are not really computer savvy. Asking managers to "ftp" is like asking them to launch a rocket. Not going to happen.

With that said, I did manage to come up with something.

I opened a Dropbox account.

Then I created a folder on it.

For the managers, I found a PHP script that will allow them to UPLOAD their PDF files to that Dropbox folder. They can't see the password so they can't go digging in there.

On our office side, I setup the folder as SHARE by inviting those who should have access. Works great!

So now, the managers can upload to this folder and our peeps here can access the folder that they are invited to access. 

Thanks!


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## wmorri (May 29, 2008)

Glad you were able to figure this out. The dropbox route makes a lot of sense.


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## Fjandr (Sep 26, 2012)

If you want to use your own hosting resources rather than rely on an external service, you can also set up an FTP upload script (there are many on the web) and then set the upload directory to write-only.


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