Uploading files in Rails

Question

I want to make a section in my site where visitors can upload files (pdfs). How can this be done?

Also, after the pdf is uploaded, I need a link to that file. Rather th

Answer 1

Whilst, not directly addressing the PDF thumbnail issue "The Rails Way" is doing a series on uploading/downloading files with Rails which would be useful with large files like your PDFs.

Uploading Files: basically, they have an Apache module called ModPorter which speeds up the parsing of the multipart HTTP request containing the upload.

Downloading Files: use X-SendFile to let Apache serve the download, once your Rails app has performed any user authentication required