django-datatables-view 1.4

What is it?
===========

django-datatables-view is a base view for handling server side processing for the awesome datatables (http://datatables.net).

django-datatables-view simplifies handling of sorting, filtering and creating JSON output, as defined at:
http://datatables.net/usage/server-side


Usage
=====

1. pip install django-datatables-view

2. views.py:

django_datatables_view uses GenericViews, so your view should just inherit from base class: BaseDatatableView, and override few things.
These are:

* order_columns - list of column names used for sorting (eg. if user sorts by second column then second column name from this list will be used in order by).
* get_initial_queryset - method that should return queryset used to populate datatable
* filter_queryset - if you want to filter your datatable then override this method
* prepare_results - this method should return list of lists (rows with columns) as needed by datatables

See example below:

:::python

from django_datatables_view.base_datatable_view import BaseDatatableView

class OrderListJson(BaseDatatableView):
# define column names that will be used in sorting
# order is important and should be same as order of columns
# displayed by datatables. For non sortable columns use empty
# value like ''
order_columns = ['number', 'user', 'state']

# set max limit of records returned, this is used to protect our site if someone tries to attack our site
# and make it return huge amount of data
max_display_length = 500

def get_initial_queryset(self):
# return queryset used as base for futher sorting/filtering
# these are simply objects displayed in datatable
return MyModel.objects.all()

def filter_queryset(self, qs):
# use request parameters to filter queryset

# simple example:
sSearch = self.request.POST.get('sSearch', None)
if sSearch:
qs = qs.filter(name__istartswith=sSearch)

# more advanced example
filter_customer = self.request.POST.get('customer', None)

if filter_customer:
customer_parts = filter_customer.split(' ')
qs_params = None
for part in customer_parts:
q = Q(customer_firstname__istartswith=part)|Q(customer_lastname__istartswith=part)
qs_params = qs_params | q if qs_params else q
qs = qs.filter(qs_params)
return qs

def prepare_results(self, qs):
# prepare list with output column data
# queryset is already paginated here
json_data = []
for item in qs:
json_data.append([
item.number,
"%s %s" % (item.customer_firstname, item.customer_lastname),
item.get_state_display(),
item.created.strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S"),
item.modified.strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")
])
return json_data

3. urls.py

Add typical django's clause:

::: python

# ...
url(r'^my/datatable/data/$', login_required(OrderListJson.as_view()), name='order_list_json'),
# ....

4. Define HTML + JavaScript part as usual, eg:

Example JS:

::: javascript

$(document).ready(function() {
var oTable = $('.datatable').dataTable({
// ...
"bProcessing": true,
"bServerSide": true,
"sAjaxSource": "{% url order_list_json %}"
});
// ...
});