How to use the CSV MIME-type?
You could try to force the browser to open a "Save As..." dialog by doing something like:
header('Content-type: text/csv');
header('Content-disposition: attachment;filename=MyVerySpecial.csv');
echo "cell 1, cell 2";
Which should work across most major browsers.
You are not specifying a language or framework, but the following header is used for file downloads:
"Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=abc.csv"
With Internet Explorer you often have to specify the Pragma: public header as well for the download to function properly..
header('Pragma: public');
Just my 2 cents..