You could try using XMLHttpRequest
Code:
var xmlhttp = new XMLHttpRequest();
xmlhttp.open("GET", "test.txt",true);
xmlhttp.onreadystatechange=function() {
if (xmlhttp.readyState==4) {
alert(xmlhttp.responseText)
}
}
xmlhttp.send(null)
I got the example from here:
http://jibbering.com/2002/4/httprequest.html