Preamble

With DataTables you can alter the sorting characteristics of the table at initialisation time. Using the aaSorting initialisation parameter, you can get the table exactly how you want to present the information. The aaSorting parameter is an array of arrays where the first value is the column to sort on, and the second is 'asc' or 'desc' as required (it is a double array for multi-column sorting). The table below is sorted (descending) by the CSS grade. Note also that the 'Engine version' column is automatically detected as a numeric column and sorted accordingly.

Live example

Initialisation code

$(document).ready(function() {
	$('#example').dataTable( {
		"aaSorting": [[ 4, "desc" ]]
	} );
} );

Other examples

Basic initialisation

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

Advanced initialisation

• Column rendering
• Sorting without HTML tags
• Row callback
• Footer callback
• Change language information from a file (internationalisation)

API

• Dynamically add a new row
• Dynamically create a table
• Individual column filtering
• User selectable rows

Please refer to the DataTables documentation for full information about it's API properties and methods.