Reports: Downloaded XLS file now has the correct file suffix

[PerplexedTheta]

Please see issue 695

[PerplexedTheta]

Hi,

Any update on this request?

Thanks,
Jake

[andyp-uk]

What you've done looks fine. Someone will need to test then merge it. If nobody else gets to it first, I will very likely do this myself before the next release.

[andyp-uk]

Having a look at the issue myself, I see the file generated isn't actually an XLS file. Adding an XLS file suffix makes it easier for users to open the file with Excel, but there is still a warning that the file could be corrupted or unsafe.

Other members of the CORAL steering committee might want to give their opinion before this is merged.

[gmcharlt]

While looking at this, I ran across the following: back in 2016, Microsoft released a security update that made Excel refuse to load HTML files that were given an .xls extension at all (unless the website was added to a trusted list). Microsoft subsequently changed the behavior so that such files would instead be opened in "protected view". Consequently, there are theoretically some users who may not be able to open such files in Excel.

In any event, I do get a warning from Excel that the file may be corrupted. Better long term options might be to provide a CSV export option and/or a library to generate true XLS or XSLX output.