Preamble

When dealing with your own data formats, it can be desirable to define how you want sorting to occur. Using plug-in sorting functions, you have have DataTables sort data in any manner you wish. You tell DataTables how to sort a column by using the sType parameter - if it is not given then DataTables will attempt to automatically detect the type based on it's built in formatting functions.

This example shows sorting with a comma (',') for a decimal place. This sorting plug-in (and others can be found on DataTables.net.

Live example

Initialisation code

jQuery.fn.dataTableExt.oSort['numeric-comma-asc']  = function(a,b) {
	var x = (a == "-") ? 0 : a.replace( /,/, "." );
	var y = (b == "-") ? 0 : b.replace( /,/, "." );
	x = parseFloat( x );
	y = parseFloat( y );
	return ((x < y) ? -1 : ((x > y) ?  1 : 0));
};

jQuery.fn.dataTableExt.oSort['numeric-comma-desc'] = function(a,b) {
	var x = (a == "-") ? 0 : a.replace( /,/, "." );
	var y = (b == "-") ? 0 : b.replace( /,/, "." );
	x = parseFloat( x );
	y = parseFloat( y );
	return ((x < y) ?  1 : ((x > y) ? -1 : 0));
};

$(document).ready(function() {
	$('#example').dataTable( {
		"aoColumns": [
			null,
			null,
			null,
			{ "sType": "numeric-comma" },
			null
		]
	} );
} );

Other examples