Generate and download file from Word dialog - ms-word

Question

Is there a way to generate a file with some JSON content and prompt the user with a saveAs dialog.
This is from an open dialog in word.
The object could be like (will be quite a lot bigger in practice)
var obj = {a: 1, b: 2, c: 'qwerty'}
I tried to uri encode and using window.open without any luck.
content = JSON.stringify(obj);
uriContent = "data:application/octet-stream," + encodeURIComponent(content);
newWindow = window.open(uriContent, 'filename');

Answer 1

I did this for XML, but it requires some back-end and front-end work. On the backend, you need some ASPX like this:
string filename = "export.xml";
byte[] data = Convert.FromBase64String(Request.QueryString[0].Replace("\"", ""));
string decodedString = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8.GetString(data);
// set the http content type to "APPLICATION/OCTET-STREAM
Response.ContentType = "APPLICATION/OCTET-STREAM";
System.String disHeader = "Attachment; Filename=\"" + filename + "\"";
Response.AppendHeader("Content-Disposition", disHeader);
Response.Flush();
Response.Write(decodedString);
I called mine "download.aspx." Then on the front-end, you have to use AJAX. This created a form region on the page and the forces a submit of the form to start the download:
// Helper function to load a form and then send the post results to a
// new window so that we can get the download button
function ajax_download(url, data, input_name) {
try {
$('#form-div').append("<form method='GET' action='" +
url + "' target='_blank'>" +
"<input type=hidden name='" + input_name + "' value='" +
JSON.stringify(data) + "'/></form>");
$('#form-div').find('form').submit();
} catch (err) {
showNotification("error", err.description);
}
}
To call it, you simply make this this call from your JavaScript code where you want it:
xml = "<xml><data>12345</data></xml>";
ajax_download('./Download.aspx', btoa(xml), 'xml');
In this case, mine is targeting XML and always creates a file called "export.xml", but you can adjust it as needed.