django-datatables-view 1.6

Django datatables view

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. Install django-datatables-view ###

pip install django-datatables-view

### 2. Edit views.py ###

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

* **model** - the model that should be used to populate the datatable
* **columns** - the columns that are going to be displayed
* **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).
* **filter_queryset** - if you want to filter your datatable then override this method

For more advanced customisation you might want to override:

* **get_initial_queryset** - method that should return queryset used to populate datatable
* **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):
# The model we're going to show
model = MyModel

# define the columns that will be returned
columns = ['number', 'user', 'state', 'created', 'modified']

# 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 render_column(self, row, column):
# We want to render user as a custom column
if column == 'user':
return '%s %s' % (row.customer_firstname, row.customer_lastname)
else:
return super(OrderListJson, self).render_column(row, column)

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

### 3. Edit urls.py ###

Add typical django's urlconf entry:

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

### 4. Define HTML + JavaScript ###

Example JS:

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


## Another example of views.py customisation ##

from django_datatables_view.base_datatable_view import BaseDatatableView

class OrderListJson(BaseDatatableView):
order_columns = ['number', 'user', 'state']

def get_initial_queryset(self):
# return queryset used as base for futher sorting/filtering
# these are simply objects displayed in datatable
# You should not filter data returned here by any filter values entered by user. This is because
# we need some base queryset to count total number of records.
return MyModel.objects.filter(something=self.kwargs['something'])

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