ASP.NET MVC: Dowloading data as a file to local computer. SAve As dialog

Question

I generate a xml dynamically (serializing my custom type XMLDocType) in an ASP.NET MVC3 through the code below:

XMLDocType XMLdoc = new XMLDocType();
… generating contente for XMLdoc … 
XmlSerializer xml = new XmlSerializer(typeof(XMLDocType));

TextWriter writer = new StreamWriter("xmloutput.xml");

xml.Serialize(writer, XMLdoc);

writer.Close();

How can I dowload the xml content into the local computer (instead of server) through the normal downloading process in browsers (ie, opening a Save As dialog)?

Thank you.

Kenan Begić · Accepted Answer · 2019-12-13 12:42:51Z

1

you could use this class that extends ActionResult and return it in your MVC action. Also you write to MemoryStream instead of writing to local server file, and return it to user as response from Controller action.

public class FileResult : ActionResult
{
    public String ContentType { get; set; }
    public byte[] FileBytes { get; set; }
    public String SourceFilename { get; set; }

    public FileResult(byte[] sourceStream, String contentType, String sourceFilename)
    {
        FileBytes = sourceStream;
        SourceFilename = sourceFilename;
        ContentType = contentType;
    } 
}

public ActionResult DownloadFile()
{   
    MemoryStream memoryStream = new MemoryStream(); 
    XMLDocType XMLdoc = new XMLDocType();
    XmlSerializer xml = new XmlSerializer(typeof(XMLDocType));
    TextWriter writer = new StreamWriter(memoryStream);
    xml.Serialize(writer, XMLdoc);

    FileResult file = new FileResult(memoryStream.ToArray(), "text/xml", "MyXMLFile.xml");

    writer.Close();

    return file;
}

answered Dec 13, 2019 at 12:42

Kenan Begić

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2 Comments

JDias Over a year ago

In the controller I do like below: // export to .xml here! ExportXMLModel e = new ExportXMLModel(); return e.DoExportXML(o.oTable); and the code doesn't function. No Save As dialog opens in Edge and Chrome, and I don't know where the file is saved….

JDias Over a year ago

… the DoExportXML does the same thing as Kenan's DownloadFile...

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