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.NET Forum / ASP.NET / General / June 2007

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Problem displaying binary (pdf) content in IIS7

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Brad - 18 Apr 2007 19:31 GMT
I have a .net 2.0 web application project that creates a pdf file,  saves the pdf to disk  (crystal reports does this
part), and
then my code reads the pdf file and writes it to the httpresponse  The web app works great on win2003 and xp and the end
result is a pdf file is displayed in the browser.  When  I run the same code on Vista,  the browser displays the message
"Internet Explorer cannot display the web page".     If I open the same pdf file directly from the browser it displays
correctly.   If I trace the code no exceptions are thrown.  I am running this as an IIS application.     If I switch to
cassini it
works correctly.
What might cause this problem in IIS7?

Here is an example of the code  (and the page source has no html content, and agin work find under IIS running on
win2003 and xp)

       Dim outputFile As String = Path.Combine(folderPath, Current.Session.SessionID & ".pdf")
       Dim contentType As String

        contentType = "application/pdf"

       With Current.Response
           If System.IO.File.Exists(outputFile) = True Then
               .ClearContent()
               .ClearHeaders()
               .ContentType = contentType
               Dim fs As FileStream = New FileStream(outputFile, FileMode.Open)
               Try
                   Dim bufferSize As Integer = CType(fs.Length, Integer)
                   Dim bt(bufferSize) As Byte
                   fs.Read(bt, 0, bufferSize)
                   .BinaryWrite(bt)
               Catch ex As Exception
                   System.Web.HttpContext.Current.Trace.Warn(ex.Message)
                   Throw ex
               Finally
                   fs.Close()
               End Try
               '########################################
               .Flush()
               .Close()
           Else
               System.Web.HttpContext.Current.Trace.Warn("Report file not found: " & outputFile)
               Throw New Exception("PostExportToClient: File not found " & outputFile)
           End If
       End With
Reply to this Message
Walter Wang [MSFT] - 19 Apr 2007 09:01 GMT
Hi Brad,

My understanding of the issue so far is:

1) The web site is installed on IIS7 on Vista
2) When you're visiting a web page that will download a PDF file, you found
it's not working correctly. (One thing unclear to me is: are you using IE7
on the same Vista with IIS7 or from other XP/2003 system? and what's the IE
version involved here)

I just tried to test it on my side using following steps:

1) Configured and installed IIS7 on Vista
2) Created a simple web site and created a web page using your code
3) Downloaded a simple PDF file to test, for example:
http://history-matters.com/archive/pdftest.pdf
4) Installed Adobe Reader 8.0 on Vista

It seems your code is working correctly by opening the PDF document in IE7
browser window on Vista.

I believe there must be something missing here or this is an environment
specific issue.

Sincerely,
Walter Wang (wawang@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

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Reply to this Message
Walter Wang [MSFT] - 23 Apr 2007 03:22 GMT
Hi Brad,

Have you seem my last reply? Does my test works on your side? Please feel
free to let me know if there's anything I can help. Thanks.

Regards,
Walter Wang (wawang@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

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Reply to this Message
Brad - 30 Apr 2007 23:07 GMT
It works for a site under localhost,   but not for a different web other
than localhost.  However the rest of the same site (project) works
correctly.  For example aspx form pages (pages that have html content)
display correctly.

Hi Brad,

Have you seem my last reply? Does my test works on your side? Please feel
free to let me know if there's anything I can help. Thanks.

Regards,
Walter Wang (wawang@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

==================================================
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that others may learn and benefit from your issue.
==================================================

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Reply to this Message
Brad - 01 May 2007 00:21 GMT
It works for a site under localhost,   but not for a different web other
than localhost.  However the rest of the same site (project) works
correctly.  For example aspx form pages (pages that have html content)
display correctly.....And it is the same problem with an image such as jpg.
Image display in casini and localhost, but not the other webs.

Hi Brad,

Have you seem my last reply? Does my test works on your side? Please feel
free to let me know if there's anything I can help. Thanks.

Regards,
Walter Wang (wawang@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

==================================================
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that others may learn and benefit from your issue.
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Reply to this Message
Walter Wang [MSFT] - 02 May 2007 08:14 GMT
Hi Brad,

Thanks for the update.

> And it is the same problem with an image such as jpg. Image display in
casini and localhost, but not the other webs.

Do you mean that if you directly visit http://localhost/website/test.jpg
also doesn't work? What's the HTTP status code returned? In my test, if you
remove .jpg from MIME types (IIS manager, configure website's MIME Types),
you will get HTTP 404.3 error code when you visit a .jpg file from the
website.

However, in your PDF case, since we're directly telling the browser that
the content/type is "application/pdf", the MIME Types settings should not
apply here. By the way, what's the error message when you visit the page
that's generating the PDF file?

Try to create a new Application from the Root directory, this will make
sure it inherits from the settings from your root directory (since you
mentioned the root application is working fine).

Regards,
Walter Wang (wawang@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

==================================================
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that others may learn and benefit from your issue.
==================================================

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Reply to this Message
Brad - 02 May 2007 18:08 GMT
Just the opposite.  If I directly vist the pdf or image url it DOES work.  It only fails when the content is served up
via a asp.net page
Please note:  I have created multiple webs on the vista workstation.  The problem occurs on a web other than localhost.
If I use localhost all works correctly.   If I use a web other that localhost, displaying the image content from an
asp.net page fails  i.e. http://myotherweb/website/showimage.aspx ,  however accessing the image directly does work i.e.
http://myotherweb/website/test.jpg

There is no .Net error message with the error occrus (event if I step through the code no exception is raised).
Internet Explorer just shows the generic message   "Internet Explorer cannot display the webpage"

> Hi Brad,
>
[quoted text clipped - 28 lines]
>
> This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
Reply to this Message
Walter Wang [MSFT] - 03 May 2007 08:59 GMT
Hi Brad,

Thanks for the update, so the showimage.aspx is writing out binary image
data just like the PDF?

Please install Fiddler (http://www.fiddlertool.com/) and capture the
request/response between the browser and the web server to compare the
difference when the page is served using localhost and a sub website. I
think the returned HTTP status code will be different.

Regards,
Walter Wang (wawang@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

==================================================
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that others may learn and benefit from your issue.
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Reply to this Message
Brad - 07 May 2007 16:31 GMT
Fiddler does not seem capture localhost traffic (tested this on fact on several computers).    It only seems to capture
from webs other than localhost.  But here are the header differences between viewing the pdf directly and viewing it
from aspx page:

Viewing pdf directly  (pdf does display)
   HTTP/1.1 200 OK
   Content-Type: application/pdf
   Last-Modified: Mon, 07 May 2007 15:07:22 GMT
   Accept-Ranges: bytes
   ETag: "c0bf96ab990c71:0"
   Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.0
   X-Powered-By: ASP.NET
   Date: Mon, 07 May 2007 15:14:51 GMT
   Content-Length: 55193

Viewing pdf from aspx page that writes binary content using code that started this thread (pdf does not display)
   HTTP/1.1 200 OK
   Cache-Control: private
   Transfer-Encoding: chunked
   Content-Type: application/pdf
   Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.0
   X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727
   X-Powered-By: ASP.NET
   Date: Mon, 07 May 2007 14:57:16 GMT

> Hi Brad,
>
[quoted text clipped - 16 lines]
>
> This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
Reply to this Message
George Ter-Saakov - 07 May 2007 17:54 GMT
I believe for binary files you must output "Content-Length" in a header.
Cause otherwise browser does not know when transmission of the file stopped.

George.

> Fiddler does not seem capture localhost traffic (tested this on fact on
> several computers).    It only seems to capture
[quoted text clipped - 45 lines]
>> This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no
>> rights.
Reply to this Message
Brad - 08 May 2007 00:28 GMT
Interesting thought.   But why then does it work when served up by IIS5 (XP) and IIS6  (server2003)?   This exact same
same code (and the aspx apps that use them) has been working for years on both XP and 2003.

>I believe for binary files you must output "Content-Length" in a header.
> Cause otherwise browser does not know when transmission of the file stopped.
[quoted text clipped - 47 lines]
>>>
>>> This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
Reply to this Message
George Ter-Saakov - 08 May 2007 14:57 GMT
I am not a guru on HTTP protocols but with HTTP 1.0 the server will always
close connection which meant that transmission of the file ended.  With HTTP
1.1 connection might be kept open so browser does not need to reconnect if
it needs to get the bunch of pictures from the same site (Usually that is
the case with regular HTML). Browser sends a request Connection: keep-open
(something like that) and server honors it if it can.

So server might not close it right away. If server does not response with
Content-Length and do not close connection browser have no way to know that
download has stopped.

With Fiddler it all becomes a moot point. Since Fiddler might close
connection all the time ignoring that server wanted to keep connection open.
So what I am saying you might not see clear picture with Fiddler between
browser and server.

Anyway, try to add Content-Lenght and see if it worked.

George.

> Interesting thought.   But why then does it work when served up by IIS5
> (XP) and IIS6  (server2003)?   This exact same same code (and the aspx
[quoted text clipped - 57 lines]
>>>> This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no
>>>> rights.
Reply to this Message
Walter Wang [MSFT] - 08 May 2007 10:55 GMT
Hi Brad,

You can just replace 'localhost' with your computer name and Fiddler should
be able to capture the traffic.

Here's the response header at my side (both writing the PDF using stream
and visiting directly works on my side):

Viewing pdf directly:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/pdf
Last-Modified: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 07:15:36 GMT
Accept-Ranges: bytes
ETag: "8071d9865282c71:0"
Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.0
X-Powered-By: ASP.NET
Date: Tue, 08 May 2007 09:31:38 GMT
Content-Length: 48148

Viewing pdf from aspx page:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Cache-Control: private
Transfer-Encoding: chunked
Content-Type: application/pdf
Server: Microsoft-IIS/7.0
X-AspNet-Version: 2.0.50727
X-Powered-By: ASP.NET
Date: Tue, 08 May 2007 09:30:20 GMT

As you can see the log is same as yours.

Do you have another Vista box to test? This can help to confirm if it's an
environment specific issue. If another Vista box also has this issue, this
might be related to your web application (web.config or something unknown
yet), please try this with a simple web application. In this case, if you
can trim down your web application to a smaller project (while still having
the issue), please send me a copy so that I can test it on my side.

Brad, I understand this thread is rather long now and you may have some
concerns since we still haven't find the root cause; if this is urgent for
your business, I really recommend you to use our Customer Support and
Service to better troubleshoot such issue (it's non reproducible on my
side). Please see my signature for more information.

Sincerely,
Walter Wang (wawang@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

==================================================
Get notification to my posts through email? Please refer to
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ications. If you are using Outlook Express, please make sure you clear the
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promptly.

Note: The MSDN Managed Newsgroup support offering is for non-urgent issues
where an initial response from the community or a Microsoft Support
Engineer within 1 business day is acceptable. Please note that each follow
up response may take approximately 2 business days as the support
professional working with you may need further investigation to reach the
most efficient resolution. The offering is not appropriate for situations
that require urgent, real-time or phone-based interactions or complex
project analysis and dump analysis issues. Issues of this nature are best
handled working with a dedicated Microsoft Support Engineer by contacting
Microsoft Customer Support Services (CSS) at
http://msdn.microsoft.com/subscriptions/support/default.aspx.
==================================================

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
Reply to this Message
Brad - 08 Jun 2007 00:16 GMT
Walter - I found a solution to this issue.   As originally noted, my code I originally posted in this thread worked in
XP and win23k but not in Vista.  Some minor programming changes resolve the problem.  See the code example below and its
comments which note the code that was commented out and code added to make it work.

       string outputFile = Path.Combine(ReportPath, Current.Session.SessionID + "." + format.ToString());
       string contentType = "application/pdf";

// commented out next two lines
       // Response.ClearContent();
       // Response.ClearHeaders();

// added next to lines Clear and Buffer = true
       Response.Clear();
       Response.Buffer = true;

       Response.ContentType = contentType;

       FileStream fs = new FileStream(outputFile, FileMode.Open);
       try
       {
           int bufferSize = System.Convert.ToInt32(fs.Length);
           byte[] bt = new byte[bufferSize + 1];
           fs.Read(bt, 0, bufferSize);
           Response.BinaryWrite(bt);
       }
       catch (Exception ex)
       {
           throw ex;
       }
       finally
       {
           fs.Close();
       }
// commented out next two lines
      //Response.Flush();
      //Response.Close();

// added next line
      Response.End();

> Hi Brad,
>
[quoted text clipped - 67 lines]
>
> This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
Reply to this Message
Walter Wang [MSFT] - 08 Jun 2007 09:05 GMT
Hi Brad,

Interesting, I also just came along this blog yesterday about this issue on
IIS7:

#Speaking of which... : I've upgraded and now my application doesn't work
anymore
http://blogs.msdn.com/johan/archive/2007/01/23/i-ve-upgraded-and-now-my-appl
ication-doesn-t-work-anymore.aspx

Above blog also mentioned that we need to replace "Response.Flush() and
Response.Close()" with Response.End() on Vista.

The code previously worked on my side is probably because I'm using IIS6
compatibility mode.

Regards,
Walter Wang (wawang@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

==================================================
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