Prevent Excel from opening in browser - ASP / Active Server Pages

Bob Murdoch

I've got an intranet application that presents a list of files in sort of a
'central repository' web page. Each file is an href in the form <a
href=file://server/share/path/filename.ext>.

When the user clicks on an excel file, it is opening within the browser,
which unforntuntely confuses the heck out of them because the usual
Print/Print Preview menu options are not available. I would like the user
to be presented with the typical Open/Save dialog when clicking on this
link.

Over the past 16 hours or so, I've seen references to adding headers to the
repsonse, setting the content type to attachment to prevent the browser from
opening it. However, this only works if I'm generating the content or if
the file resides on the web server. The files in this case reside on
servers throughout the company.

Is there any way that I can force the browser to do the same thing as 'Save
Target As', without modifying the user mime configuration in IE (another
common suggestion), or hosting the files on the web server?

tia,

Bob M..

Jul 19 '05 #1

Subscribe Reply

6936

Ray at

In your scenario, you will need to make a change on the client machines.
The change is:

Windows Explorer:
Tools(View if NT) - Folder Options - File Types - XLS file extension (Excel
workbook if NT)
Browse in same window = FALSE
Confirm open after download = TRUE

Ray at home

"Bob Murdoch" <ra***********@ erols.com> wrote in message
news:%2******** ********@TK2MSF TNGP10.phx.gbl. ..

I've got an intranet application that presents a list of files in sort of a 'central repository' web page. Each file is an href in the form <a
href=file://server/share/path/filename.ext>.

When the user clicks on an excel file, it is opening within the browser,
which unforntuntely confuses the heck out of them because the usual
Print/Print Preview menu options are not available. I would like the user
to be presented with the typical Open/Save dialog when clicking on this
link.

Over the past 16 hours or so, I've seen references to adding headers to the repsonse, setting the content type to attachment to prevent the browser from opening it. However, this only works if I'm generating the content or if
the file resides on the web server. The files in this case reside on
servers throughout the company.

Is there any way that I can force the browser to do the same thing as 'Save Target As', without modifying the user mime configuration in IE (another
common suggestion), or hosting the files on the web server?

tia,

Bob M..

Jul 19 '05 #2

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