Create CSV from html using flash, javascript, classic asp

Question

Let me start by stating that my end goal is to create an Export to Comma Separated File (.csv) or Export to Excel button on a page of our site. Our site currently has a search mechanism that returns the data in XML. That XML is loaded into a Microsoft.XMLDOM object.

Dim objXMLDom
Set objXMLDOM = Server.CreateObject("Microsoft.XMLDOM")

...

Function LoadXML(strXML)
    objXMLDOM.loadXML(strXML)
end function

This XML data is parsed into a variable called myData and is displayed in an HTML Grid using different columns & rows. Like I said above, ideally I would like to add a button to the page that can export to csv or Excel. I've searched around and found that this is not an easy task when the code is in Classic ASP...so I found a semi-work around.

The workaround is to use Downloadify. It's a jquery/flash script that allows you to copy code into the HTML of a DOM element and then pull that data back out all on the client side. It works for the most part...the only problem I'm having is adding in a new line character. I think it gets removed going into HTML and back out again.

Here's the code for how I put data into the element

for (i = 0; i < <%=RowCount %>; i++) {
    parent.document.getElementById('data').innerHTML += '\n';
    for (j = 0; j < <%=columnCount%>; j++) {
        parent.document.getElementById('data').innerHTML += myData[i][j];
        parent.document.getElementById('data').innerHTML += ',';

    }
};

Here's what I use to pull it back out:

function load() {
    Downloadify.create('downloadify', {
        filename: function() {
            return document.getElementById('filename').value;
        },
        data: function() {
            return document.getElementById('data').value;
        },
        onComplete: function() { alert('Your File Has Been Saved!'); },
        onCancel: function() { alert('You have cancelled the saving of this file.'); },
        onError: function() { alert('You must put something in the File Contents or there will be nothing to save!'); },
        swf: 'media/downloadify.swf',
        downloadImage: 'images/download.png',
        width: 100,
        height: 30,
        transparent: true,
        append: false
    }

    );

}

I really don't know very much Flash, but I've tried putting in different strings ('<br>', '', even ";:;" ) and replacing them in the data : function part using Flash's replace method, but it seems to hang and never finish processing (i think this is because I needed to put the replace method in a while loop since the replace method only replaces one instance and I have many).

Any help will be appreciated. Thank you in advance.

that's the way the `Downloadify` plugin is already structured to work. I think i'm going to scrap it and try to work it out using only ASP & Javascript... — Mark, May 30 '12 at 11:35
@wvxvw - I can't believe I didn't see that! :-) You're suggestion worked. If you want to write it up as an answer, i'll accept it as the solution. I did have to use this question as a reference too (because my data is in an iframe) http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1301540/set-variable-in-parent-window-from-iframe — Mark, May 30 '12 at 15:27
We export to csv, excel, txt, and access. All in less than 2000 lines of code :P Yeah it is kind of a pain. Though the 2000 includes things like translating the recordsets, decrypting columns, etc. — Brian White, May 31 '12 at 19:08

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered May 29 '12 at 17:28

1

why don't you have the ASP create a .csv file along with the html page? It seems like that would be a lot easier.

answered May 29 '12 at 17:28

PitaJ

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This "answer" is more of a comment and ought to be added as a comment to the question. – AnthonyWJones May 29 '12 at 20:49

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 01 '12 at 07:35

I had a problem like this awhile back when I was using Flash and ASP together. I remember calling ASP from Flash and it hanging. I THINK the fix was to add a "response.end" to the end of the ASP page. That seemed to tell the server, "Done. Back to Flash now." Sorry I can't be more sure. It was a long time ago and I can't find the code.

Create CSV from html using flash, javascript, classic asp

2 Answers2