php - How do I get csv file to download on IE? Works on firefox

Question

I'm struggling with an odd error. I have a simple web app that grabs stuff from a DB then outputs it as a downloadable csv file. It works on firefox and chrome, but IE fails to recognize it as a csv file (thinking it is a html fle) and when I click save I get the error, "Unable to download {name of file} from {name of site}. Unable to open this internet site. ..."

Code:

session_start();

//some logic goes here...  

//generate csv header  
header("Content-type: application/octet-stream");  
header("Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=exportevent.csv");  
header("Pragma: no-cache");  
header("Expires: 0");  

echo "Event: " . $event_title . "
";  

//print the column names  
echo "Last Name, First Name, Company 
";  

while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result))  
{  
    echo $row['atlname'] . ',' . $row['atfname'] . ',' . $row['atcompany'] . "
";      
}

I've played around with the content-type a whole bunch, but that had no effect.

Update: I've tried text/csv, application/vnd.ms-excel (and variations of this), text/plain, and some others that I now forget with no luck.

This is IE8 btw.

Update 2: The connection is over SSL.

Answer 1

Don't we love IE? :)

Try using those headers:

  header("Pragma: public");
  header("Expires: 0");
  header("Cache-Control: must-revalidate, post-check=0, pre-check=0");
  header("Cache-Control: private",false);
  header("Content-Type: application/octet-stream");
  header("Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="exportevent.csv";" );
  header("Content-Transfer-Encoding: binary"); 

I think that the octet-stream content type forces IE to download the file.