Issue: When trying to view an Excel (XLS) report on Internet Explorer in Windows, a blank page comes up.
Microsoft Office documents, including XLS files, can embed programming scripts and macros that could pose to be dangerous if it was created with malicious intent. Internet Explorer 7 is built with a number of restritive security settings by default that blocks potentially threatening file downloads.
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When you click to download an XLS report, IE will ask you if you are sure that you want to download this file. However, when you click on this message to allow it to continue with the download, a blank page appears instead of the report.
Solution:
There are 4 possible solutions:
- Use Firefox.
This is the recommended solution. If you do not already have Firefox, you can download it from the Mozilla site. - Hold down the [CTRL] key when you click on the report link.
If you want to keep your current IE security settings in place and want to bypass the security warning message for a particular instance, hold down the [CTRL] key and left-click on the report link.
This is the simplest solution requiring no configuration setup, however, you will need to hold down the [CTRL] key every time you download a report. - Change IE's security settings for USC sites only.
If you want to change the security seeing to trust all USC downloads to bypass the warning message permanently, go to IE's Internet Options and list "usc.edu" as a Trusted Site. Then change the "Automatic prompting for file downloads" security setting to "Enable"
See the help file for detailed instructions on how to do this.
This is the recommended solution if you want change the setting permanently on IE. All downloads from sites not on your Trusted Sites list will continue to be filtered through the regular Internet Zone security settings.
- Change IE's security settings for all sites.
If you want to change the security seeing for all downloads from any Web site permanently, go to IE's Internet Options and customize the security setting for Internet zone. Then change the "Automatic prompting for file downloads" security setting to "Enable"
See the help file for detailed instructions on how to do this.
Use this solution only if you are sure you want to allow all file downloads from any site on the Web.