Question

I am using rails 2.3.14 with ruby 1.8.7 and I want to download a csv file without writing it to any directory.

My code:

  def export
    @news = News.find(:all, :conditions => ["updated_at >= ? and news_source_id != 1 and ready = 1", 1.week.ago])
    file_name = "Non_linksv_news_#{1.week.ago.strftime('%b-%d-%Y')}_to_#{Time.now.strftime('%b-%d-%Y')}.csv"
    File.open(file_name, "w") do |file|
      file_name << %w(Source Headline).to_csv
      @news.each { |news| file_name << [news.news_source.name, news.news_headline].to_csv }
    end
    send_file file_name
  end

It creates a file in directory then downloads. I don’t want to create file.

Answer 1

Solved

  def export
    ns = NewsSource.find_by_name 'Linksv', :select => :id
    @news = News.find(:all, :conditions => ["updated_at >= ? and news_source_id != ? and ready = 1", 1.week.ago, ns.id])
    file_name = "linksv_news_#{1.week.ago.strftime('%b-%d-%Y')}_to_#{Time.now.strftime('%b-%d-%Y')}.csv"
    csv = %w(Source Headline).to_csv
    @news.each { |news| csv << [news.news_source.name, news.news_headline].to_csv }

    send_data csv, :filename => file_name, :type => "text/csv"
  end

It will generate csv file in proper way, with rows and columns