How can I open an excel from a java jsp javascript?

Question

I have a JSP, with a link: Open EXCEL file. If you click on it, it should open the something.xls with microsoft excel.

I tried it with the <a> tag, but it doesn't work:

<a href="./something.xls" target="_blank">
    Open EXCEL file
</a>

Could anyone give me some useful code, and help, how to open an xls by excel from jsp? Thank you!

create a JSP tag yourself which would take the name as parameter and will seach for that name and will open the file . — Hussain Akhtar Wahid 'Ghouri', Sep 24 '13 at 13:24
Whether the file will download or open in Excel, or even open in the browser itself, is all determined by the user's browser settings. You have no control over this. — developerwjk, Sep 24 '13 at 14:35

score 3 · Answer 1 · answered Sep 24 '13 at 13:21

3

NO simply,you cannot open like that,Since the files can be open/downloaded by browser,and HTML/Javascript cannot have access to those system level programms.

You might need some Applet/Flash codes,which have access to communicate with system level.

answered Sep 24 '13 at 13:21

Suresh Atta

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We can open it using `Runtime.getRuntime().exec("excel C:\\file.xls");`, actually i just tried it and working on it – kark Sep 24 '13 at 13:22
3

So it's open the file on server.Not on user's machine – Suresh Atta Sep 24 '13 at 13:25
Oh fine ..when i executed this code ...it just asked me to open , when i click yes , it just opened in excel – kark Sep 24 '13 at 13:28

score 1 · Answer 2 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:28

1

It sounds like you are trying to get Excel to open on your client machine. As long as that is really what you are trying to do - then you would need to send the appropropriate mime type in your response header to let the browser know they type of they file is 'xls'.

See this question: Setting mime type for excel document

That also means that you would have to have a servlet manage the download rather than simply using an HTML anchor tag directly pointing to the file on the server. Or, you would need to configure your server to send the appropriate mime type whenever a spreadsheet file is being sent to the browser.

Try putting this in your web.xml file:

<!-- Set Excel mime-mapping so spreadsheets open properly instead of being sent as an octet/stream -->
<!-- If this is not done, the user may be prompted to save the file, or it may open as garbage text in the browser --> 
<mime-mapping> 
    <extension>xls</extension> 
    <mime-type>application/vnd.ms-excel</mime-type> 
</mime-mapping>

(credit: http://wiki.metawerx.net/wiki/Web.xml.MimeMapping)

edited May 23 '17 at 12:28

Community

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answered Sep 24 '13 at 13:33

JayDM

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I put this mime tag, and then what? where should I write and what, to open the xls? the XLS is in the package – victorio Sep 24 '13 at 14:10
You would put the mapping in the web.xml file in the war file. – JayDM Sep 24 '13 at 19:05
Are you expecting to be able to save your changes back to the server? If so, then I don't think there is going to be a way to do that. – JayDM Sep 24 '13 at 19:11
You would use the download link that you were originally using (which I assume was causing the file to simply be downloaded to your computer). Only after you changed the server configuration to notify your browser that the file is an Excel spreadsheet...it should try to open whatever app your computer has configured to open spreadsheets with. – JayDM Sep 24 '13 at 23:18

How can I open an excel from a java jsp javascript?

2 Answers2