Generating and downloading an excel file generates a ERR_INVALID_RESPONSE - php

Question

This is my code:
public function downloadexcel($requestId) {
$this->loadModel('MaterialsRequest');
$materialsRequests = $this->MaterialsRequest->find('all', array('conditions' => array('MaterialsRequest.request_id' => $requestId)));
date_default_timezone_set('Europe/London');
if (PHP_SAPI == 'cli')
die('This example should only be run from a Web Browser');
/** Include PHPExcel */
//require_once dirname(__FILE__) . '/../Classes/PHPExcel.php';
// Create new PHPExcel object
$objPHPExcel = new PHPExcel();
// Set document properties
$objPHPExcel->getProperties()->setCreator("mez")
->setLastModifiedBy("mez")
->setTitle("Supply Template")
->setSubject("Supply Template")
->setDescription("Supply Template , please fill and upload.")
->setKeywords("office 2007 openxml php")
->setCategory("Supply");
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()->getColumnDimension('A')->setWidth(10);
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()->getColumnDimension('B')->setWidth(40);
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()->getColumnDimension('C')->setWidth(30);
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()->getColumnDimension('D')->setWidth(30);
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()->getStyle('A')->getAlignment()->setHorizontal(PHPExcel_Style_Alignment::HORIZONTAL_LEFT);
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()->getStyle('B')->getAlignment()->setHorizontal(PHPExcel_Style_Alignment::VERTICAL_CENTER);
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()->getStyle('C')->getAlignment()->setHorizontal(PHPExcel_Style_Alignment::VERTICAL_CENTER);
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()->getStyle('D')->getAlignment()->setHorizontal(PHPExcel_Style_Alignment::VERTICAL_CENTER);
// Add some data
$objPHPExcel->setActiveSheetIndex(0)
->setCellValue('A1', 'Material ID')
->setCellValue('B1', 'Material Name')
->setCellValue('C1', 'Quantity')
->setCellValue('D1', 'Your offer');
$index = 2;
foreach ($materialsRequests as $oneMaterialsRequests) {
$objPHPExcel->setActiveSheetIndex(0)
->setCellValue('A' . $index, $oneMaterialsRequests['MaterialsRequest']['material_id'])
->setCellValue('B' . $index, $oneMaterialsRequests['Material']['name'])
->setCellValue('C' . $index, $oneMaterialsRequests['MaterialsRequest']['qty'])
->setCellValue('E' . $index, $oneMaterialsRequests['MaterialsRequest']['id']);
$index++;
}
/// Set sheet security
$MaterialsRequestsNo = count($materialsRequests);
$MaterialsRequestsNo+=1; //add count for header
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()->getProtection()->setSheet(true);
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()
->getStyle('D2:D' . $MaterialsRequestsNo)
->getProtection()->setLocked(
PHPExcel_Style_Protection::PROTECTION_UNPROTECTED
);
// Miscellaneous glyphs, UTF-8
// Rename worksheet
$objPHPExcel->getActiveSheet()->setTitle('Supply');
// Set active sheet index to the first sheet, so Excel opens this as the first sheet
$objPHPExcel->setActiveSheetIndex(0);
// Redirect output to a client’s web browser (Excel2007)
header('Content-Type: application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.spreadsheetml.sheet');
header('Content-Disposition: attachment;filename="Supply.xlsx"');
header('Cache-Control: max-age=0');
// If you're serving to IE 9, then the following may be needed
header('Cache-Control: max-age=1');
// If you're serving to IE over SSL, then the following may be needed
header('Expires: Mon, 26 Jul 1997 05:00:00 GMT'); // Date in the past
header('Last-Modified: ' . gmdate('D, d M Y H:i:s') . ' GMT'); // always modified
header('Cache-Control: cache, must-revalidate');// HTTP/1.1
header('Pragma: public'); // HTTP/1.0
$objWriter=PHPExcel_IOFactory::createWriter($objPHPExcel,'Excel2007');
$objWriter->save('php://output');
exit;
}
From my local server operating on lamp when I call this function I can get the excel sheet and the web page would close after I call the function, when I'm calling it however on my apache server it brings out the error: ERR_INVALID_RESPONSE, I went through the code putting a die(); after each line to see how it would respond and up until putting a die() after $objWriter=PHPExcel_IOFactory::createWriter($objPHPExcel,'Excel2007'); it would download the spreadsheet but it would be corrupted and wouldn't close the page and it wouldn't bring up that error message, however apparently $objWriter->save('php://output'); is causing the error to come up, the page would freeze and the excel file wouldn't get downloaded.
I debugging someone else's code but I can't figure this part out.

Answer 1

Eventually the issue was in the ZipArchive class, that's why it worked on one server and didn't work on the other.
More documentation here: http://www.php.net/manual/en/zip.installation.php

Answer 2

I had the same problem. Check with "php -m" It gives you a list of modules and check if You have the "zip" module installed. http://php.net/manual/en/book.zip.php
This module is needed for PhpExcel. If you don´t have it, try to install or change your php version. In my case I solved changing my php from 7 to php 5.5

Answer 3

You can try saving to temp file and serving it with the redirect instead:
$objWriter->save('wwwroot/some-file.xlsx');
header("Location: /some-file.xlsx");
exit();

Answer 4

Now with php 7.4 you have to use --with-zip option

Answer 5

in php 7.4
//$objWriter=PHPExcel_IOFactory::createWriter($objPHPExcel,'Excel2007');
$objWriter = PHPExcel_IOFactory::createWriter($objPHPExcel, 'Excel5');
$objWriter->save('php://output');
exit;