Extract a file from a ZIP string

Question

I have a BASE64 string of a zip file that contains one single XML file.

Any ideas on how I could get the contents of the XML file without having to deal with files o

Answer 1

After some hours of research I think it's surprisingly not possible do handle a zip without a temporary file:

1. The first try with php://memory will not work, beacuse it's a stream that cannot be read by functions like file_get_contents() or ZipArchive::open(). In the comments is a link to the php-bugtracker for the lack of documentation of this problem.
2. There is a stream support ZipArchive with ::getStream() but as stated in the manual, it only supports reading operation on an opened file. So you cannot build a archive on-the-fly with that.
3. The zip:// wrapper is also read-only: Create ZIP file with fopen() wrapper

4. I also did some attempts with the other php wrappers/protocolls like

    file_get_contents("zip://data://text/plain;base64,{$base64_string}#test.txt")
    $zip->open("php://filter/read=convert.base64-decode/resource={$base64_string}")
    $zip->open("php://filter/read=/resource=php://memory")
   

   but for me they don't work at all, even if there are examples like that in the manual. So you have to swallow the pill and create a temporary file.

---

Original Answer:

This is just the way of temporary storing. I hope you manage the zip handling and parsing of xml on your own.

Use the php php://memory (doc) wrapper. Be aware, that this is only usefull for small files, because its stored in the memory - obviously. Otherwise use php://temp instead.

open('php://memory'));