Question

I am trying to use PHP to force a download on a client computer (with the file dialog- nothing sinister). I have found many pages that recommend I use the header() function to control the response from my PHP script, but I am having no luck with this. The code I have is as follows:

$file = $_POST['fname'];

if(!($baseDir . '\\AgcommandPortal\\agcommand\\php\\utils\\ISOxml\\' . $file)) {
    die('File not found.');
} else {
    header('Pragma: public');
    header('Content-disposition: attachment; filename="tasks.zip"');
    header('Content-type: application/force-download');
    header('Content-Length: ' . filesize($file));
    header('Content-Description: File Transfer');
    header('Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary');
    header('Connection: close');
    ob_end_clean();
    readfile($baseDir . '\\AgcommandPortal\\agcommand\\php\\utils\\ISOxml\\' . $file);
}

I am calling it using this JavaScript:

        $.ajax({
            url: url,
            success: function(text) {
                var req = new XMLHttpRequest();
                req.open("POST", 'php/utils/getXMLfile.php', true);
                req.setRequestHeader("Content-type", "application/x-www-form-urlencoded");
                req.send('fname=' + encodeURIComponent(text));
            }
        });

This returns the contents of the file as text, but does not trigger a download dialog. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Answer 1

Instead of using AJAX, just redirect the browser to the relevant URL. When it receives the content-disposition:attachment header, it will download the file.