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Returning a linked Word document AND a page

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Genimuse

Genimuse

Programmer
Joined
May 15, 2003
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1,797
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So... I've got a form where the user selects some options and clicks a button. What I'd like to happen is that the form submits to itself (no prob), and upon returning it both redraws the form AND returns a... well, a Word document, sort of. Ideally the form would reappear in the browser window and Word would open the document at the address I sent back.

That is, I'm not trying to return a Word doc and an HTML form, but rather activate a link along the lines of \\ServerName\DirectoryName\File.doc and the HTML form, getting Word to open the file in question. I have no problem if IE insists on asking the user if they'd like to open or save it, if necessary, but I still want to effectively just send a link and have Word open it.

Does that make sense? Any idea on (a) how I return two things (I see it happen with "download" pages all the time, so I assume it's in the headers), and (b) how to send a link to be opened by Word, not the Word doc itself?
 
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ok something like this...

Code: 
<html>
<body>
<form>
'your form here
</form>
<%
if request.form("submit")<>"" then 'self referencing form
'show your search results in a table format or whatever format you want...lets say table format...

if rs.EOF AND rs.BOF then
response.write "sorry no records"
else
%>
<table>
<tr>
<th>link to word doc</th>
<th>Name of the doc</th>
<th>Description of the doc</th>
</tr>
do until rs.eof
%>
<tr>
<td><a href="#" onclick=viewdoc('<%=docid%>')>put word image here</a></td>
<td><%=rs("Name")%></td>
<td><%=rs("Description")%></td>
</tr>
</table>
<script language="vbscript">
sub viewdoc(docid)
window.open "[URL unfurl="true"]http://yourservername/&docid&.doc"[/URL]
end sub
</script>
</body>
</html>

okay i have just written the logic here without testing the code...i am sure there might be some mistakes with quotes and so on..so please test it...

-DNG
 
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That's the idea, except for the parts I didn't make clear. ;-)

I know how to do the form submitting to itself and all that, but here's where I hit the problem.

What actually happens after the user submits the form is that I write out an Excel doc in the background, which is used as a source for a Word mail merge. Unfortunately if you open up a Word doc in a browser window, the mail merge tools are unavailable, so it has to be opened in Word itself. Because this is an intranet environment, I can point the user to "\\Server\Directory\document.doc" in a link and the Word doc will actually open up in Word, as opposed to an " which will open up as a Word doc inside the browser.

The page is designed to allow the user to select some criteria, and then hit a button to have Word open up with the appropriate document, ready to just hit the Merge button, AND the form is still sitting their with their old form criteria.

I can manage the form, and I know there's a way to return both an HTML document as well as a file (witness the many sites where you click a Download button for some application and it returns a pages saying "your download should start now" and then the download does), but I don't know how to do it.

In addition I don't know how to return not a file itself, but a pointer to a file on the server, along the lines of the "\\Server..." stuff.

Ideally there is no button or hyperlink that links to the document; rather, a button submits the criteria and the web server returns both the updated form and the Word doc, as separate items.

Does that make more sense?
 
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