How to return a PDF in an action result in MVC

Question

I have a little problem getting my head around this problem. I have an ajax call that should render an iframe which loads a PDF. The PDF is generated using Apache FOP hosted in another environment. What I have so far is:

in the controller action (where the src element of the iFrame points), the code snippet is:

var targetStream = new MemoryStream();    
using (var response = FOPrequest.GetResponse()) // response from FOP
                {
                    using (var stream = response.GetResponseStream())
                    {
                        stream.CopyTo(targetStream);

                    }
                }
 return new FileStreamResult(targetStream, "application/pdf");

However, this does not work as expected. The stream is populated as expected, but the PDF does not render in the iFrame. I get a Http response code of 200 (OK).

I'd be grateful of any help.

Answer 1

You use MVC FileContentResult to return ActionResult For example:

return File(fileArray, contentType, fileName)

another stack Answer

Answer 2

You can make use of the return type as FileResult here like this :

public FileResult getFile(string CsvName)
{
   //Add businees logic here
   byte[] fileBytes = System.IO.File.ReadAllBytes(System.Web.Hosting.HostingEnvironment.MapPath("~/Content/Uploads/records.csv"));
   string fileName = CsvName;
   return File(fileBytes, System.Net.Mime.MediaTypeNames.Application.Octet, fileName);
}

Might not be the exact solution, you can manipulate and develop your own.

Hope this helps.