Download binary without triggering onbeforeunload

Question

I want to kick off a file download for a user when he clicks a link, but I have an onbeforeunload handler that I don't want to get invoked when the download begins. To downloads, I currently have an <a> with the href set to the file location but clicking it results in onbeforeunload being invoked in Chrome (not in FF, though).

I know I can set a private flag and check that in the onbeforeunload handler, but is there some way to kick off the download using ajax? I still want the user to see the usual dialogs when they download the file (Open/Save etc).

Ideas?

Answer 1

Add the download attribute to the a tag, which seems to prevent onbeforeunload from firing:

<a download href="mysite.com"></a>

From this answer.

Answer 2

I know this answer is really late, but there's a simple solution. Create an iframe dynamically, and set the "src" of it to your download url via JavaScript. This'll kick off the download without triggering the unload event (I think).