Download an Excel using Servlet

How to download an Excel using Servlet?

Create a workbook using any frameworks and write out the created workbook to response.getoutputstream(). For creating the excelsheet I am using apache poi. Set the content type of response to "application/vnd.ms-excel" and set response header as   "Content-Disposition", "attachment; filename=YourExcelName.xls".

Download an Excel using Servlet Example


package com.programtalk.beginner.tutorial;

import java.io.IOException;

import javax.servlet.ServletException;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServlet;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletRequest;
import javax.servlet.http.HttpServletResponse;

import org.apache.poi.hssf.usermodel.HSSFCell;
import org.apache.poi.hssf.usermodel.HSSFCellStyle;
import org.apache.poi.hssf.usermodel.HSSFRow;
import org.apache.poi.hssf.usermodel.HSSFSheet;
import org.apache.poi.hssf.usermodel.HSSFWorkbook;

// Extend HttpServlet class
public class DownLoadExcelServlet extends HttpServlet {
	private static final long serialVersionUID = 2067115822080269398L;

	public void init() throws ServletException {
		// Do nothing
	}

	public void doGet(HttpServletRequest request, HttpServletResponse response) throws ServletException, IOException {

		try {
			response.setContentType("application/vnd.ms-excel");
			response.setHeader("Content-Disposition", "attachment; filename=SampleExcel.xls");
			HSSFWorkbook workbook = createExcel();
			workbook.write(response.getOutputStream());
		} catch (Exception e) {
			throw new ServletException("Exception in DownLoad Excel Servlet", e);
		}
	}

	private HSSFWorkbook createExcel() {
		HSSFWorkbook workbook = new HSSFWorkbook();
		HSSFSheet worksheet = workbook.createSheet("My First POI Worksheet");

		HSSFRow row1 = worksheet.createRow(0);

		HSSFCell cellA1 = row1.createCell(0);
		cellA1.setCellValue("Hurray! You did it.");
		HSSFCellStyle cellStyle = workbook.createCellStyle();
		cellA1.setCellStyle(cellStyle);
		return workbook;
	}

	public void destroy() {
		// do nothing.
	}
}

 

Discussion

Should I close HttpServletResponse.getOutputStream()?

You should not close the stream. The servlet container will automatically close the stream after the servlet is finished running as part of the servlet request life-cycle.

Summary

So here we learned to download an excel using a servlet. In case of any comments or questions, please leave a note in the comments section below.

2 thoughts on “Download an Excel using Servlet”

  1. When I use it on mine the file comes out corrupted… Am I messing something up? Check it out:

    public void retornaArquivoExcel(HttpServletResponse response) throws ServletException, IOException {
    try {
    response.setContentType(“application/vnd.ms-excel”);
    response.setHeader(“Content-Disposition”, “attachment; filename=SampleExcel.xls”);
    HSSFWorkbook workbook = createExcel();
    workbook.write(response.getOutputStream());
    } catch (Exception e) {
    throw new ServletException(“Exception in DownLoad Excel Servlet”, e);
    }

    }
    private HSSFWorkbook createExcel() {
    HSSFWorkbook workbook = new HSSFWorkbook();
    HSSFSheet worksheet = workbook.createSheet(“My First POI Worksheet”);

    HSSFRow row1 = worksheet.createRow(0);
    HSSFRow row2 = worksheet.createRow(1);

    HSSFCell cellA1 = row1.createCell(0);
    cellA1.setCellValue(“Hurray! You did it.”);
    HSSFCellStyle cellStyle = workbook.createCellStyle();
    cellA1.setCellStyle(cellStyle);

    HSSFCell cellA2 = row2.createCell(0);
    cellA2.setCellValue(“Test”);
    cellStyle = workbook.createCellStyle();
    cellA2.setCellStyle(cellStyle);

    return workbook;
    }

    Reply

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