How to force browser download dialog

[swand9]

Hi,
I need to downlad a server side generated csv file with Javascript.
I need to send the login name and password and I don't want to use GET as I want to avoid a visible password in the URL.
Further, my displayed HTML page should not reload.

This is what I have tried:

1) Ajax:

var link = "http://.....";
var base = base64Encode("k320i:xxxxx");
var xhr = new XMLHttpRequest();
  var async = false;
  xhr.open("POST", link, async);
  xhr.setRequestHeader("Content-Type", "application/x-www-form-urlencoded");
  xhr.setRequestHeader("Authorization", "Basic " + base);
  xhr.send("a=XXXX");

-> This works fine, but no download dialog pops up in the browser, the response arrives as xhr.responseTex t

2) A hidden POST Form

<form id="downloadFormPOST" action="http://localhost:8080/io/rest/stat/k320i/2008-10-19/2009-10-20T12:00/test.csv" method="post" target="_blank">
  <input type="hidden" name="_loginName" value="k320i">
  <input type="hidden" name="_password" value="xxxx">
</form>

And trigger it like this:

var downloadForm = window.document.forms['downloadFormPOST'];
    downloadForm.submit();

But now the password is not transmitted
Can I somehow attach Basic authentication to above form?

Question: What is the correct approach?


Thanks
Marcel

[acoder]

What's the header set to for the CSV page? If you make a normal GET request, does it work?

[swand9]

Hi again,

the "2) A hidden POST Form" works!
It was my mistake on server side (a Java REST servlet) during parsing the form data.

But "1) Ajax" I didn't find a way to popup the browser download dialog during a Ajax response inside the browser (via Javascript)

So I'm using now solution 2).

I'm still curious: How to attach HTTP basic authentication to the <form> markup?

thanks
Marcel

[acoder]

http://www.peej.co.uk/articles/http-...tml-forms.html - a bit experimental, but should help.