Preamble

The foundation for DataTables is progressive enhancement, so it is very adept at reading table information directly from the DOM. Therefore, if your user's browser is capable the user will get a DataTables enhanced experience. Otherwise they get the plain HTML.

Live example

Initialisation code

$(document).ready(function() {
	$('#example').dataTable();
} );

Other examples

Basic initialisation

• Zero configuration
• Feature enablement
• Sorting data
• Multi-column sorting
• Multiple tables
• Hidden columns
• DOM positioning
• State saving
• Alternative pagination styles
• Change language information (internationalisation)
• ThemeRoller themes (Smoothness)

Advanced initialisation

• Events (pre initialisation)
• Events (post initialisation)
• Column rendering
• Sorting without HTML tags
• Multiple table controls (sDom)
• Custom toolbar (element) around table
• Set sorting controls
• Column grouping through col/row spans
• Row grouping
• Row callback
• Footer callback
• Change language information from a file (internationalisation)

Data sources

• DOM
• Javascript array
• Ajax source
• Server side processing

Server-side processing

• Obtain server-side data
• Add extra HTTP variables
• Use HTTP POST
• Custom column ordering (in callback data)
• Pipelining data (reduce Ajax calls for paging)
• Show and hide details about a particular record
• User selectable rows (multiple rows)

API

• Dynamically add a new row
• Individual column filtering
• Highlight rows and columns
• Show and hide details about a particular record
• User selectable rows (multiple rows)
• User selectable rows (single row) and delete rows
• Editable rows (with jEditable)
• Submit form with elements in table
• Index column (static number column)
• Show and hide columns dynamically
• Regular expression filtering

Plug-ins

• Add custom API functions
• Sorting and type detection
• Custom pagination controls
• Range filtering / custom filtering
• Live DOM sorting

Please refer to the DataTables documentation for full information about its API properties and methods.