Using ServletOutputStream to write very large files in a Java servlet without memory issues

Question

I am using IBM Websphere Application Server v6 and Java 1.4 and am trying to write large CSV files to the ServletOutputStream for a user to download. Files are

Answer 1

I have used a class that wraps the outputstream to make it reusable in other contexts. It has worked well for me in getting data to the browser faster, but I haven't looked at the memory implications. (please pardon my antiquated m_ variable naming)

import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.OutputStream;

public class AutoFlushOutputStream extends OutputStream {

    protected long m_count = 0;
    protected long m_limit = 4096; 
    protected OutputStream m_out;

    public AutoFlushOutputStream(OutputStream out) {
        m_out = out;
    }

    public AutoFlushOutputStream(OutputStream out, long limit) {
        m_out = out;
        m_limit = limit;
    }

    public void write(int b) throws IOException {

        if (m_out != null) {
            m_out.write(b);
            m_count++;
            if (m_limit > 0 && m_count >= m_limit) {
                m_out.flush();
                m_count = 0;
            }
        }
    }
}