Question

I’m making an XMLHttpRequest using ExtJS to a service that returns no responseText, just a 204 and the response header TotalNearby. The call works perfectly using Firefox, but with Internet Explorer 8, both alert boxes are empty. What am I doing wrong?

Ext.Ajax.request({
    url: 'services/getNearby',
    method: 'GET',
    params: {
        'lat': 34,
        'lon': -90
    },
    headers: {
        'Authorization': AUTH_TOKEN
    },
    success: function(response) {
        if (response.status == 204) {
            alert(response.getAllResponseHeaders());
            alert(response.getResponseHeader('Total-Nearby'));
        }
    },
    failure: function(response) {
        alert('Server status ' + response.status);
    }
});

Answer 1

According to the site http://www.enhanceie.com/ie/bugs.asp this is an IE 7/8 bug:

IE0013: IE XMLHTTP implementation
turns 204 response code into bogus
1223 status code

Described here
http://dev.jquery.com/ticket/1450, the
XMLHTTPRequest object in IE will
return a status code of 1223 and drop
all response headers if the server
returns a HTTP/204 No Content
response.

This is caused by an internal design
artifact of URLMon (binding returns
Operation Aborted (1223) if the server
returns no content in response to a
request).

Repros in IE8, IE7 (and probably
earlier).

Workaround: Treat “1223” as equivalent
to a 204. Note: HTTP headers remain
unavailable in this case.

If you are seeing empty alerts, meaning IE did not change the status code to 1223, then that part of the bug may have been fixed. However, I would be more worried about the statement:

Note: HTTP headers remain unavailable in this case.

as this appears to be the problem you’re facing. Do you need to use a service that does not respond with content? You might be better suited to return a typical response with a message body.