Digital Download link without prompting customer to OPEN or SAVE

[AshW]

Hello

I was wondering if anyone could offer some advice on the following please?

We offer digital downloads of zipped software products, but are using HTML pages as the actual downloadable product (rather than the software file directly).

The customer opens the HTML page, and then downloads a zipped software product from a link on that page. The reason for this is because we need to provide some written instructions about unzipping/installing the product etc before the customer downloads the product.

The problem we're having is that the download link generated by the basket (i.e. on the receipt page and e-mail confirmation) is not being treated in the same way as a standard link to a web page. When the customer clicks the link, they are given the option to OPEN or SAVE the HTML document.

Ideally we'd like the download link to simply open a browser window without prompting the customer to OPEN or SAVE it.

I'm not sure if it's possible to solve this, but would be grateful if anyone had any suggestions please.

Regards

Ash W

[leehack]

I can't see that ever working as you are providing a html file, not a html link. You would need to provide a URL not a file name, i can't see that being possible to solve.

The only solution i could offer is for you to provide a ReadMe.txt file in the download as these are very common nowadays, you could also provide the html file if you like with this approach. I think this approach is the lesser of two evils as they download one zip file and have all they need.

[AshW]

Hi Lee

Thank you for your advice regarding my post.

I suspected that it may not be possible, but thought it worth asking.

The problem we're having is that a reasonable amount of customers are having problems understanding the process of unzipping our software and MP3 products prior to use, so I thought it would be useful if we could offer some instructions before they download.

We're providing a README file with the downloads, and a web page outlining the same instructions (which is also linked to from the receipt e-mail), but are still seeing some confusion unfortunately.

Kind Regards

Ash

[Duncan Rounding]

Self-extracting zip files might be worth considering.

[AshW]

Hi Duncan

Thanks for your advice.

We're trying to make things as easy as possible for customers, and are in the process of developing a Windows installer for our downloadable software - so hopefully that will help matters.

Regards

Ash