asp.net LinkButton HyperLink problem

Question

The following two controls on my page:

<asp:LinkButton ID="OpenLB" runat="server" >Open</asp:LinkButton>
<asp:HyperLink ID="OpenHL" runat="server">Open</asp:HyperLink>

I set them during page load like this:

OpenLB.PostBackUrl = @"file:\\web\documents-emails\doc1.docx";
OpenHL.NavigateUrl = @"file:\\web\documents-emails\doc1.docx";

OpenHL works, it opens the word file.

OpenLB doesnt work, when I click on it, I get a error pop-up that says:

Windows Internet Explorer Cannot find file 'file://web//documents-emails//doc1.docx'. Make sure the path or Internet address is correct.

It looks like the url is different or something, how can I fix this?

Answer 1

The LinkButton works by posting the web page back to the server using the given url. It displays the button in the style of a hyperlink, but uses javascript to post the form back to the server at the given url. You won't be able to use it with a file: url since you can't POST to a local file. The HyperLink just creates an anchor which results in the location of the browser being set to the url when it is clicked.