http Downloading Files and Browser Issues

While working on a project, I needed to download a document from the database and stream it to the client.  Our standard browser was IE 7+ and the standard code implementation documented throughout many forums the following with the first line simply obtaining the file via a service:

 byte[] fileContents = csc.GetFileContent(this.CurrentContentId);

Response.ClearContent();

Response.ContentType = this.ContentType;

Response.AddHeader("content-disposition", string.Format("attachment;

       filename={0}", this.ContentFileName));

Response.AddHeader("content-length", fileContents.Length.ToString());

Response.BinaryWrite(fileContents);

Response.Flush();

Response.End(); 

The "Response.End()" at the end will cause a ThreadAbort exception within IE and other browsers.  The solution to this was to wrap this code inside a try-catch block and absorb the ThreadAbortException as follows:

try 

{

   //code above here

}

catch(ThreadAbortException taEx)

{

   //absort exception thrown by Response.End

}

catch(Exception ex)

{

   //error handling

}

The problem with this is that some browsers like Apples Safari will throw an Exception regardless.  The solution is to change the code to the following:

byte[] fileContents = csc.GetFileContent(this.CurrentContentId);

Response.ClearContent();

Response.ContentType = this.ContentType;

Response.AddHeader("content-disposition", string.Format("attachment;

       filename={0}", this.ContentFileName));

Response.AddHeader("content-length", fileContents.Length.ToString());

Response.BinaryWrite(fileContents);

Response.Flush();

Response.Close(); 

HttpContext.Current.ApplicationInstance.CompleteRequest();

The above will get rid of the ThreadAbortException exception.