angularjs - Spring - download response as a file

Question

I am writing application using AngularJS and Spring. I would like to send request to the server and download response returned from controller as a file. In controller I have content of csv file (as string) i.e. 1;2;3;4 (1 row, 4 columns). What is the simplest way to download this response as a file?

Below, I posted my simplified code. In Spring controller:

@RequestMapping(value = "/csv", method = GET)
@ResponseBody
public String getCsvFile() {
    return getCsvContent();
}

In javascript (AngularJS)

return $http({method: 'GET', url: 'csv/'});

I was trying to write to the response stream also (below), setting headers, but on client side I always get this content as a string - not as a file to download.

@RequestMapping(value = "/csv", method = GET)
@ResponseBody
public void getCsvFile(HttpServletResponse response) {
    response.setContentType("application/csv");
    response.setHeader("Content-Disposition", "attachment; filename=file.csv");
    response.setContentLength(getCsvContent().getBytes().length);
    ServletOutputStream out = response.getOutputStream();
    out.write(getCsvContent());
    out.flush();
    out.close();
}

Does anyone knows how to write controller's method correctly in order to download response as a file on client side?

Answer 1

You can't download a file through an XHR request (which is how Angular makes it's requests). See Why threre is no way to download file using ajax request? You either need to go to the URL via $window.open or do the iframe trick shown here: JavaScript/jQuery to download file via POST with JSON data