Reference

This reference details the public APIs that DataTables and its extensions present, with all of the information that you, the developers using DataTables, need to be able to interact with the table programmatically. The manual summarises how the APIs can be used, but the reference here deals with the nitty-gritty of the implementation details and shows code examples of how each interface can be used.

Options

DataTables and its extensions have a wealth of options which can be configured using the initialisation object that is passed into the $().DataTable() constructor when creating a new table. This section details all of these options, with code examples of how each option can be used. Read more »

API

The DataTables API allows manipulation of the table, data retrieval and other operations on the table after it has been initialised. The DataTables API makes heavy use of chaining to provide an intuitive and expressive API, that allows you to get the maximum amount done with the minimum amount of code. Read more »

Features

Features in DataTables are control and information components that are displayed around the table and allow the end user to interact with it. Features are placed around the table using the layout option, and features which support customisation options can also be tuned through the layout object. Read more »

Events

It can often be useful to know when a DataTable or one of its extensions has performed a particular operation, since user interfaces, by their very nature are asynchronous with user interaction driving the controls of the table. For this purpose, DataTables will emit custom events which can be listened for and acted upon as needed. Read more »

Buttons

It is often useful to present a button or set of buttons that will affect the DataTable or the data contained in the DataTable, allowing the end user to perform operations on the table. The Buttons extension provides a common core library for such buttons and the various DataTables extensions can provide buttons that are used to access the functionality of that extension. Read more »

Types

The interfaces DataTables presents often expect, or return, specific data types. These data types are fully defined here, for clarity in the documentation. Read more »