Add preview feature when people click the direct link instead of forcing to download

Hi,

Thanks for adding your feature request here.

I have a distributor that I need to include a datasheet for each product, and they require a link for those datasheet. I just noticed that if I put the link to the browser, it is automatically downloaded I contacted the support team and I was told it's not possible to open the file on the browser at current version unless I create a page for each file, which is impossible for me to do so as we have so many files. I would request to add the ability to preview a PDF file in a browser when people click the file with direct link instead of forcing to download.

This feature is not implemented yet, but I'll add it to our feature request list and keep that in mind for a future release.

Thanks a lot!
Best Regards,

Add my vote for having a way to view PDFs in browser. I'd never use the google previewer option on our site. It's awkward and limited.

I would love to be able to use a shortcode option e.g. [wpfd_category id="1" target="browser"] to instruct the plugin to open in browser. That's all I would need and it would add a whole layer of versatility to the plugin. There are so many file types which work better opening in-browser than downloading.

When you added [theme=""] to the shortcodes, it really simplified how one can deploy files throughout a site. That was an excellent addition, and it feels like this could be another simple but powerful upgrade.

Being able to have an option to open PDFs in-browser would be a game changer for us. Like the previous poster mentioned, we also host a large catalog of documentation which people need to be able to pop in and out of throughout the day--without filling their downloads folder with files. They just need to view a PDF really quick and get the info they need.

We utilize the plugin as more of a document library than a "download" plugin. While we do offer certain file types which are downloaded, the vast majority of our documents (over 95%) are PDFs. WP File Download does such a fantastic job of organizing files and allowing easy deployment in a variety of ways. By creating a hierarchy of products, we are able to have a master page of all our product manuals using just the shortcode for our Product Manuals folder in file tree view. Since we have subfolders for individual products, we are able to embed each product's subfolder within individual product pages. This way users can find the documents they need on the master page, or just by visiting the product page. Because of the plug-in, we can add a new file to a folder and poof, a new file is added to the master page, all the individual products pages, and anywhere else it needs to be.

Great job with the plug-in. Keep the updates coming.

Thanks!

Hi quardt,

Thanks for contacting us here about this extension.

This feature is not possible currently, we noted that in our planning list.
To resolve this for local files, you can enable the "Open PDF in browser" option in the Frontend tab.

Cheers,

Thanks for the reply.

I'm not sure I fully understand your answer. You mentioned that "this is not possible currently". But later you say "for local files you can enable the 'Open PDF in browser' option in the Frontend tab." So is it already feature? All our PDFs are hosted on our own server (not remotely)--is that what you mean by local files?

But then also you mentioned, "we noted that in our planning list". Does this mean you have the feature down as a possible addition?

I'm a little confused. I love the plug-in and really hope to be able to open PDFs in-browser.

Thanks for your patience.