adding a PayPal button to my website

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David Berg:
I need to sell a PDF. 

I am fluent in HTML and know a teeny bit of javascript.

How do I make it so that when you click on a link on my site, it:
1) takes you to PayPal and specifies my PayPal account as the recipient
2) gives you the PDF file after you're done with the PayPal stuff, but only if you paid the right amount?

Perhaps I should just be browsing the PayPal site, but I figured I'd first try to tap the experience of folks here who have undoubtedly done the exact thing I'm looking for.

Thanks,
-David

Eero Tuovinen:
You need to get a "merchant account" with Paypal to get access to their buy buttons, I think. After that you just follow the instructions - getting those buttons set up is trivial, but hooking up your PDF basically requires you to do some little PHP programming, as you need to make the successful payment redirect to a php script that evaluates the Paypal confirmation and only offers the PDF if it succeeds. Paypal has documentation for what sort of input and output their system provides, so this is not impossible if you know what you're doing.

You could ask somebody to make the right code for you if that seems too difficult.

Nathan P.:
Hey David,

Paypal makes it trivially easy to make your Buy Now button, and then you simply copy-and-paste the HTML they give you. It's pretty painless, in my experience.

Personally, I just email the PDF to customers (as opposed to having an automated system like Eero). Paypal sends you a notification of purchase, and when you hit Reply it replies-to the customers email. Again, trivially easy. I suppose it means that someone has had to wait some number of hours between buying the PDF and me replying, but hey, such is life.

I hope some of that helps!

Eero Tuovinen:
Oh, I don't have an automatic PDF delivery system myself, either. I know in theory how to code it, but my time is sparse, and I much rather spend it on game writing than coding web pages. Hand-delivery also gives a modicum of personal contact.

David Berg:
I'd like to learn how to do the server-side stuff (though I'd have to go with .asp, not .php) just to be able to do it, but if I don't have time, the email option is a good one.  I check my email religiously enough that I shouldn't keep many folks waiting, and yeah, that small degree of personal contact could be fun.

Thanks for filling me in on the options!

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