PlaintextHelper

<?php
/* Basic CakePHP helper to output plaintext content and prompt to save as file.
 * Based on CSVHelper:
 * http://bakery.cakephp.org/articles/view/csv-helper-php5
 */
class PlaintextHelper extends AppHelper
{
    var $filename;

    public function render($output = '', $filename = null)
    {
        if (!empty($filename) && is_string($filename))
        {
            $this->setFilename($filename);
        }
        header ('Expires: Mon, 1 Apr 1974 05:00:00 GMT');
        header ('Last-Modified: ' . gmdate('D,d M YH:i:s') . ' GMT');
        header ('Pragma: no-cache');
        header('Content-disposition:attachment;filename='.$this->filename);
        header('Content-type: text/plain');

        return $this->output($output);
    }

    /**
     * Sets the output filename. Automatically appends .txt if necessary.
     *
     * @param string $filename Filename to save as
     * @access public
     */
    public function setFilename($filename)
    {
        if (!empty($filename))
        {
            if (strtolower(substr($filename, -4)) != '.txt')
            {
                $filename .= '.txt';
            }
            $this->filename = $filename;
        }
    }
}

// controller:

var $helpers = array('Plaintext');

// VERY contrived example:

public function text($id)
{
    $this->set(
        'data',
        $this->User->read(null, $id)
    );
    $this->set('filename', 'user_'.$id.'_'.date('Y-m-d').'.txt');
    Configure::write('debug', 0);
    $this->layout = 'ajax';
    $this->viewPath = 'elements/users';
    $this->render('txt_dump');
}

// app/views/elements/users/txt_dump.ctp:

<?php
if (isset($filename)) $plaintext->setFilename($filename);

echo $plaintext->render($data['User']['first_name'] . ' ' . $data['User']['last_name']);