Hi Monks,

I'm writing a script that sits on a webserver, and does all it's output through CGI. When a user selects an option to download a particular file (call it file.txt), I want a "Save As" dialog box to come up in their browser, rather than having their browser simply display the text. I've tried the following:
print "Content-Disposition:attachment;filename=file.txt\n";
print "Content-type: text/plain\n\n";

[download]
But that simply display the text in the browser. I've also tried:
print "Content-Disposition:attachment;filename=file.txt\n";
print "Content-type: application/octet-stream\n\n";

[download]
But that seems to force the Windows2000 users to save the file as file.txt.exe (they can modify the file.txt part, but not the .exe part). Not having the most patient users in the world, I'd really like to have it saved simply as file.txt. I Suppose I could let the browser display the text and have them do "file"->"save", but here again, they're impatient and want things to go more smoothly.

Any suggestions? Thanks!

In reply to File Download from CGI Script by Anonymous Monk

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.