I am having a user who is reporting that files are being displayed as raw data in his browser. He uses Internet Explorer.
The files are being served via a .ashx handler file and it has been working until.
This is the relevant part of my .ashx handler:
context.Response.Clear()
context.Response.AppendHeader("Content-Disposition", "attachment; filename=" + name)
context.Response.AppendHeader("Content-Length", size.ToString)
context.Response.ContentType = "application/pdf"
context.Response.TransmitFile(fullname)
context.Response.Flush()
HttpContext.Current.ApplicationInstance.CompleteRequest()
Can anyone figure something out of this screenshot?
Update: this behaviour appears on Windows 10 when running either IE 11 or Edge and only the second time a file is being opened. It happens for both .pdf and .docx files.
This is the code I use to stream PDFs to a client. It works in IE 11. The main difference is that I am using BinaryWrite which based on your code, you may not want to do..
HttpContext.Current.Response.Clear();
HttpContext.Current.Response.AddHeader("Content-Type", "application/pdf");
HttpContext.Current.Response.AddHeader("Content-Disposition", "inline; filename=" + fileName + ".pdf");
HttpContext.Current.Response.BinaryWrite(bytes);
HttpContext.Current.Response.End();
There might be a solution here
I'll like this as well just in case..
According to this thread, it could be as simple as replacing Response.Close with Response.End (or in your case.. adding)
I finally found the answer myself - it had to do with the HTTP header content-length which i mistakenly submitted with a value exactly 1byte too large.
This caused the strange behavior in only IE/Edge and only Windows 10 as described in the OP.
I had the same problem with an aspx page that transmits file to browser in Page_Load event handler.
My mistake was an absense of
Response.End();
method call. When I added this line the problem has gone.
I am at a loss here. I am trying to transmit a file on the local intranet site. When I get a download prompt in IE11, it says:
Do you want to open or save "SomePage.aspx?fileID=12345"? [open] [save] [cancel]
Instead of..
Do you want to open or save "Document.pdf"? [open] [save] [cancel]
It works perfectly fine on Chrome. The file gets downloaded with the correct filename. But for some reason, IE isn't setting the name and instead uses the ASPX name.
The code is rather straightforward:
testFile = New System.IO.FileInfo("\\someshare\somefolder$\Document.pdf")
Response.Clear()
Response.AddHeader("Content-Disposition", "attachment; filename=" & testFile.Name)
Response.AddHeader("Content-Length", testFile.Length.ToString())
Response.ContentType = "application/octet-stream"
Response.TransmitFile(testFile.FullName)
I've tried a number of different header options and the MIME type makes no difference.
Does anyone have a clue why this would be happening?
Notes: Not HTTPS. It is not limited to PDF, same happens with .TIF, .DOC, and every other format I've tested.
EDIT: Have also tried Response.WriteFile as well as Response.BinaryWrite .. same thing each time.
EDIT2: Simplified everything down to a single button on a completely blank page.
You should have quote marks around the file name. See 19.5.1 on http://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616-sec19.html
i.e.
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="fname.ext"
so...
Response.AddHeader("Content-Disposition", String.Format("attachment; filename=""{0}""", testFile.Name))
Unfortunately I have not been able to test if this solves your issue as I don't have access to IE11 at the moment.
So I know this question is older, but the solution I finally came up with to this problem is to add the following two lines to my code.
Response.SuppressContent = True
and
HttpContext.Current.ApplicationInstance.CompleteRequest()
You have said in previous comments that you have tried the CompleteRequest command to no avail.
As a note, I am not 100% certain to the logistics of the Response.SuppressContent() command.
The documentation says that it indicates "whether to send HTTP content to the client". This seems counter intuitive to the process of sending the request body back to the client, however, it appears to only suppress the parts of the response that include any HTML.
It seems that the partial or incomplete HTML is what causes the filename to appear as the page name regardless of the headers set and sent. Stripping this out should cause the file to download properly.
Interestingly, this solution is actually born out of a secondary issue where once I was able to export the file using ClosedXML, i was receiving messages when opening the document that there were errors than excel would try to fix.
Response.SuppressContent actually fixed that as well. Hope this helps or at least points you in the right direction.
Is it possible to get the browser to popup its Save As... dialog when doing a POST (rather than GET) request?
Using the Spring framework, I'm trying to build a service that will receive some data (a two-dimensional json array), and produce an Excel file that the user is prompted to download.
By doing a GET request, eg by browsing directly to my URL, I can get the browser to display the popup by setting headers similar to this:
response.setHeader("Content-Disposition", "attachment; filename=" + fileName)
response.setContentType("application/vnd.ms-excel")
I need to allow the client to post the data that will be used to build the Excel file though, which implies a POST request. The same headers are returned, but no popup.
Is there a way to achieve this, or does the popup appear only for GET requests?
I'm thinking I could do a two-step process; 1) allow the client to POST the data, and return some sort of reference key, 2) allow the client to do a GET request and include the key, and return the relevant headers to cause the browser to popup the dialog.
Any other thoughts on how to do this?
Thanks
It's possible. I'm not sure what I did wrong the first time I tried it out.
i am sending a large amount of excel content data to the browser using Page.Response.Write("") in a for loop.
before starting the loop i am changing the conetnt type of the reponse.context property to "ms-excel".
if i have an exception during that for loop , i try to popup an error message to the browser by registering an HTML startup script block and Write it to the browser. before the write i change back the content type to be text/html.
but i get an error that say that is not possible to change the content type after sending the HTTP Headers.
How to notify the browser about an error that occured during that for loop?
Is it possible to have more that one respone to the same browser tab?
by the way,right now i don't want to use ASP.NET AJAX.
Did you try Response.ClearHeaders(); before changing the context type?
If that doesn't work because your Response.Write is causing problems, you might think about going the route of building a string before deciding your content type and then setting the headers.
Loop trough the content and add to a StringBuilder
If no error, set contenttype to ms-excel and write out SB
If there is an error, leave contenttype as it is write out your error message as needed.
Page.Response.Write("") will send data to the browser. When you do that the browser needs to know the type of content it gets in order to render it correct. If you already told the browser what kind of content you have(and even if you don't, you are already sening data with Response.Write, it will use the default value which I think is text/html) then you can't take it back. Whatever you are saying to the client is said and you can't take it back.
The way to solve your problem is to cache the reply as suggested by Doozer.
/Tibi
My app generates PDFs for user consumption. The "Content-Disposition" http header is set as mentioned here. This is set to "inline; filename=foo.pdf", which should be enough for Acrobat to give "foo.pdf" as the filename when saving the pdf.
However, upon clicking the "Save" button in the browser-embedded Acrobat, the default name to save is not that filename but instead the URL with slashes changed to underscores. Huge and ugly. Is there a way to affect this default filename in Adobe?
There IS a query string in the URLs, and this is non-negotiable. This may be significant, but adding a "&foo=/title.pdf" to the end of the URL doesn't affect the default filename.
Update 2: I've tried both
content-disposition inline; filename=foo.pdf
Content-Type application/pdf; filename=foo.pdf
and
content-disposition inline; filename=foo.pdf
Content-Type application/pdf; name=foo.pdf
(as verified through Firebug) Sadly, neither worked.
A sample url is
/bar/sessions/958d8a22-0/views/1493881172/export?format=application/pdf&no-attachment=true
which translates to a default Acrobat save as filename of
http___localhost_bar_sessions_958d8a22-0_views_1493881172_export_format=application_pdf&no-attachment=true.pdf
Update 3: Julian Reschke brings actual insight and rigor to this case. Please upvote his answer.
This seems to be broken in FF (https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=433613) and IE but work in Opera, Safari, and Chrome. http://greenbytes.de/tech/tc2231/#inlwithasciifilenamepdf
Part of the problem is that the relevant RFC 2183 doesn't really state what to do with a disposition type of "inline" and a filename.
Also, as far as I can tell, the only UA that actually uses the filename for type=inline is Firefox (see test case).
Finally, it's not obvious that the plugin API actually makes that information available (maybe someboy familiar with the API can elaborate).
That being said, I have sent a pointer to this question to an Adobe person; maybe the right people will have a look.
Related: see attempt to clarify Content-Disposition in HTTP in draft-reschke-rfc2183-in-http -- this is early work in progress, feedback appreciated.
Update: I have added a test case, which seems to indicate that the Acrobat reader plugin doesn't use the response headers (in Firefox), although the plugin API provides access to them.
Set the file name in ContentType as well. This should solve the problem.
context.Response.ContentType = "application/pdf; name=" + fileName;
// the usual stuff
context.Response.AddHeader("content-disposition", "inline; filename=" + fileName);
After you set content-disposition header, also add content-length header, then use binarywrite to stream the PDF.
context.Response.AddHeader("Content-Length", fileBytes.Length.ToString());
context.Response.BinaryWrite(fileBytes);
Like you, I tried and tried to get this to work. Finally I gave up on this idea, and just opted for a workaround.
I'm using ASP.NET MVC Framework, so I modified my routes for that controller/action to make sure that the served up PDF file is the last part of the location portion of the URI (before the query string), and pass everything else in the query string.
Eg:
Old URI:
http://server/app/report/showpdf?param1=foo¶m2=bar&filename=myreport.pdf
New URI:
http://server/app/report/showpdf/myreport.pdf?param1=foo¶m2=bar
The resulting header looks exactly like what you've described (content-type is application/pdf, disposition is inline, filename is uselessly part of the header). Acrobat shows it in the browser window (no save as dialog) and the filename that is auto-populated if a user clicks the Acrobat Save button is the report filename.
A few considerations:
In order for the filenames to look decent, they shouldn't have any escaped characters (ie, no spaces, etc)... which is a bit limiting. My filenames are auto-generated in this case, and before had spaces in them, which were showing up as '%20's in the resulting save dialog filename. I just replaced the spaces with underscores, and that worked out.
This is by no names the best solution, but it does work. It also means that you have to have the filename available to make it part of the original URI, which might mess with your program's workflow. If it's currently being generated or retrieved from a database during the server-side call that generates the PDF, you might need to move the code that generates the filename to javascript as part of a form submission or if it comes from a database make it a quick ajax call to get the filename when building the URL that results in the inlined PDF.
If you're taking the filename from a user input on a form, then that should be validated not to contain escaped characters, which will annoy users.
Hope that helps.
Try placing the file name at the end of the URL, before any other parameters. This worked for me.
http://www.setasign.de/support/tips-and-tricks/filename-in-browser-plugin/
In ASP.NET 2.0 change the URL from
http://www. server.com/DocServe.aspx?DocId=XXXXXXX
to
http://www. server.com/DocServe.aspx/MySaveAsFileName?DocId=XXXXXXX
This works for Acrobat 8 and the default SaveAs filename is now MySaveAsFileName.pdf.
However, you have to restrict the allowed characters in MySaveAsFileName (no periods, etc.).
Apache's mod_rewrite can solve this.
I have a web service with an endpoint at /foo/getDoc.service. Of course Acrobat will save files as getDoc.pdf. I added the following lines in apache.conf:
LoadModule RewriteModule modules/mod_rewrite.so
RewriteEngine on
RewriteRule ^/foo/getDoc/(.*)$ /foo/getDoc.service [P,NE]
Now when I request /foo/getDoc/filename.pdf?bar&qux, it gets internally rewritten to /foo/getDoc.service?bar&qux, so I'm hitting the correct endpoint of the web service, but Acrobat thinks it will save my file as filename.pdf.
If you use asp.net, you can control pdf filename through page (url) file name.
As other users wrote, Acrobat is a bit s... when it choose the pdf file name when you press "save" button: it takes the page name, removes the extension and add ".pdf".
So /foo/bar/GetMyPdf.aspx gives GetMyPdf.pdf.
The only solution I found is to manage "dynamic" page names through an asp.net handler:
create a class that implements IHttpHandler
map an handler in web.config bounded to the class
Mapping1: all pages have a common radix (MyDocument_):
<httpHandlers>
<add verb="*" path="MyDocument_*.ashx" type="ITextMiscWeb.MyDocumentHandler"/>
Mapping2: completely free file name (need a folder in path):
<add verb="*" path="/CustomName/*.ashx" type="ITextMiscWeb.MyDocumentHandler"/>
Some tips here (the pdf is dynamically created using iTextSharp):
http://fhtino.blogspot.com/2006/11/how-to-show-or-download-pdf-file-from.html
Instead of attachment you can try inline:
Response.AddHeader("content-disposition", "inline;filename=MyFile.pdf");
I used inline in a previous web application that generated Crystal Reports output into PDF and sent that in browser to the user.
File download dialog (PDF) with save and open option
Points To Remember:
Return Stream with correct array size from service
Read the byte arrary from stream with correct byte length on the basis of stream length.
set correct contenttype
Here is the code for read stream and open the File download dialog for PDF file
private void DownloadSharePointDocument()
{
Uri uriAddress = new Uri("http://hyddlf5187:900/SharePointDownloadService/FulfillmentDownload.svc/GetDocumentByID/1/drmfree/");
HttpWebRequest req = WebRequest.Create(uriAddress) as HttpWebRequest;
// Get response
using (HttpWebResponse httpWebResponse = req.GetResponse() as HttpWebResponse)
{
Stream stream = httpWebResponse.GetResponseStream();
int byteCount = Convert.ToInt32(httpWebResponse.ContentLength);
byte[] Buffer1 = new byte[byteCount];
using (BinaryReader reader = new BinaryReader(stream))
{
Buffer1 = reader.ReadBytes(byteCount);
}
Response.Clear();
Response.ClearHeaders();
// set the content type to PDF
Response.ContentType = "application/pdf";
Response.AddHeader("Content-Disposition", "attachment;filename=Filename.pdf");
Response.Buffer = true;
Response.BinaryWrite(Buffer1);
Response.Flush();
// Response.End();
}
}
I believe this has already been mentioned in one flavor or another but I'll try and state it in my own words.
Rather than this:
/bar/sessions/958d8a22-0/views/1493881172/export?format=application/pdf&no-attachment=true
I use this:
/bar/sessions/958d8a22-0/views/1493881172/NameThatIWantPDFToBe.pdf?GeneratePDF=1
Rather than having "export" process the request, when a request comes in, I look in the URL for GeneratePDF=1. If found, I run whatever code was running in "export" rather than allowing my system to attempt to search and serve a PDF in the location /bar/sessions/958d8a22-0/views/1493881172/NameThatIWantPDFToBe.pdf. If GeneratePDF is not found in the URL, I simply transmit the file requested. (note that I can't simply redirect to the file requested - or else I'd end up in an endless loop)
You could always have two links. One that opens the document inside the browser, and another to download it (using an incorrect content type). This is what Gmail does.
For anyone still looking at this, I used the solution found here and it worked wonderfully. Thanks Fabrizio!
The way I solved this (with PHP) is as follows:
Suppose your URL is SomeScript.php?id=ID&data=DATA and the file you want to use is TEST.pdf.
Change the URL to SomeScript.php/id/ID/data/DATA/EXT/TEST.pdf.
It's important that the last parameter is the file name you want Adobe to use (the 'EXT' can be about anything). Make sure there are no special chars in the above string, BTW.
Now, at the top of SomeScript.php, add:
$_REQUEST = MakeFriendlyURI( $_SERVER['PHP\_SELF'], $_SERVER['SCRIPT_FILENAME']);
Then add this function to SomeScript.php (or your function library):
function MakeFriendlyURI($URI, $ScriptName) {
/* Need to remove everything up to the script name */
$MyName = '/^.*'.preg_quote(basename($ScriptName)."/", '/').'/';
$Str = preg_replace($MyName,'',$URI);
$RequestArray = array();
/* Breaks down like this
0 1 2 3 4 5
PARAM1/VAL1/PARAM2/VAL2/PARAM3/VAL3
*/
$tmp = explode('/',$Str);
/* Ok so build an associative array with Key->value
This way it can be returned back to $_REQUEST or $_GET
*/
for ($i=0;$i < count($tmp); $i = $i+2){
$RequestArray[$tmp[$i]] = $tmp[$i+1];
}
return $RequestArray;
}//EO MakeFriendlyURI
Now $_REQUEST (or $_GET if you prefer) is accessed like normal $_REQUEST['id'], $_REQUEST['data'], etc.
And Adobe will use your desired file name as the default save as or email info when you send it inline.
I was redirected here because i have the same problem. I also tried Troy Howard's workaround but it is doesn't seem to work.
The approach I did on this one is to NO LONGER use response object to write the file on the fly. Since the PDF is already existing on the server, what i did was to redirect my page pointing to that PDF file. Works great.
http://forums.asp.net/t/143631.aspx
I hope my vague explanation gave you an idea.
Credits to Vivek.
Nginx
location /file.pdf
{
# more_set_headers "Content-Type: application/pdf; name=save_as_file.pdf";
add_header Content-Disposition "inline; filename=save_as_file.pdf";
alias /var/www/file.pdf;
}
Check with
curl -I https://example.com/file.pdf
Firefox 62.0b5 (64-bit): OK.
Chrome 67.0.3396.99 (64-Bit): OK.
IE 11: No comment.
Try this, if your executable is "get.cgi"
http://server,org/get.cgi/filename.pdf?file=filename.pdf
Yes, it's completely insane. There is no file called "filename.pdf" on the server, there is directory at all under the executable get.cgi.
But it seems to work. The server ignores the filename.pdf and the pdf reader ignores the "get.cgi"
Dan