Manual
Editor provides the ability for end users to quickly and easily edit data contained in a DataTable. The Editor and DataTables packages contain everything you need to create editable tables in just minutes is available:
- Editor
- Three visual editing modes for the end user to modify data with (main, bubble and inline)
- A wealth of options and comprehensive API to customise the display with
- Buttons integration for complex row selection and control button options
- Server-side libraries to perform the database update actions requested by the end user
- DataTables
- Display complex data in beautiful tables easily
- Provide the end user with the ability to search, sort and page the data
- And much more.
While the goal is to present an easily to use interface for your end users, of equal important is the interface that you, the developers working with Editor, use! This manual details those interfaces, including the options, API, styling and the pre-build server-side libraries. Everything needed to get up and running with Editor, and to take you right through to advanced integration and configuration options.
DataTables Editor manual
Installing
The Editor download package includes a number of examples which can be a great way of viewing the capabilities of Editor, and modifying the example code can be of great benefit when working with Editor for the first time to experiment with features and options. This manual page describes in detail the process of downloading Editor and getting the ready built examples up and running on your server. Read more »
Getting started
This section of the manual describes the process of downloading the DataTables and Editor source packages, including the required files on your web-pages and then basic initialisation of Editor. Everything needed to start editing your tables on your own pages! Read more »
Options
Editor's basic operations can be easily customised through configuration options that are given to it when you create an Editor instance. These options define how the instance will interface with the server, how the end user will interact with the form, and the fields that are contained in the form. This section of the manual shows how the available options can be used and shows examples of setting up Editor with the most common options. Read more »
API
While Editor is easy to configure for simple use cases, to unlock the real power of Editor, you'll want to use its API. The API provides the ability to control each individual Editor instance, with complete control over the fields in the form, what editing display is shown to the end user and what interaction options they have. This manual page discusses in detail what the API is, how to use it and what it can achieve. Read more »
Events
Events play an important role in Editor, particularly in complex and dynamic web-applications, as you will often want to take an action when Editor performs a certain operation. For example, knowing when an Ajax request has been completed or simply knowing when the Editor form has been show. The custom events Editor triggers allows you know when these operations occur. Read more »
Internationalisation
The Editor interface makes use of text to provide information to the end user to indicate what each part of the form does. Much of this text will be provided by your configuration of the form (for example fields.label), but Editor also has a number of built in strings which are used. These default strings are in English, but can easily be translated into another language, or customised to suit your needs. Read more »
Multi-row editing
Enabling an end user to be able to select multiple rows in a DataTable and group edit the values is a very powerful feature and can greatly simplify complex editing interactions, allowing data updates to be performed very quickly. The ability to create and edit multiple rows was introduced in Editor 1.5 and this document provides an overview of how it operates from end user and developer points of view. Read more »
Templates
Forms can provide users with the ability to input and control complex information, and every hint that provides the user with information about what data is expected can provide significant benefits in terms of speed of correct entry. The layout of a form is one element of this, giving grouping information for related fields and prioritisation. Editor supports complex layouts through its template option, allowing you to define any DOM structure to match your form. Read more »
Upload
File upload is an important part of any modern CRUD library such as Editor and Editor provides two field types to make it super easy to provide upload options to your end users. These two field types provide the ability to upload a single file, or multiple files for a single field. Read more »
Client / server data
Communication between the client-side (the web-browser) and the server-side is a fundamental aspect of Editor, since the server is where the data for the table is permanently stored and any changes requested by the end user need to be communicated to the server, which must also be able to tell the client-side the latest data. Editor uses a well defined protocol for the exchange of information to ensure that server-side programs that interface with Editor can be written for any platform. Read more »
Standalone
While Editor is primarily designed to be software that provides an editing interface for DataTables, it can also be used as a standalone form editor without DataTables. This can be very useful for single dimension configuration data (for example, Enable service: Yes/No) or for editing the data of a database row on an individual page, rather than a Javascript modal. Read more »
Security
Computer and data security are fundamental components of software development, particularly in an application where read / write actions are performed, such as Editor. Editor can provide editing access to potentially sensitive information, so it is important that you understand how DataTables and Editor handle software security and the options available to customise the actions taken. This page will discuss web security attacks that are directly relevant to DataTables and Editor, along with methods for how you can combat them. Read more »
Generator
Generator is a great way to kick start your development process for using Editor by very quickly allowing you to set up an editable table, utilising DataTables, Buttons and Editor, saving you huge amounts of development time. Generator will provide the HTML, Javascript, SQL and server-side scripts (PHP, NodeJS, .NET Core and .NET Framework) needed for a full editable table. This manual page walks through how to create a simple to-do list, super quickly with Generator. Read more »
Styling
When integrating Editor with your site / app, you may find that you wish to customise the style of particular aspects of the interface it shows to end users, or have it integrate fully with a styling library such as Bootstrap. This section of the documentation discusses in detail the structure of the DOM elements that Editor uses, so you can apply suitable classes and styles in your CSS, and also discusses how Editor can be integrated with external CSS libraries. Read more »
.NET libraries
The Editor package includes a set of .NET libraries that provide everything DataTables and Editor need on the server-side to update data on a database with the minimum of code and development time on your page. This section of the manual describes these libraries and how they can be used. Read more »
PHP libraries
Editor comes with a set pre-built PHP (5.3+) libraries which are designed to make it super easy to create a script on the server-side that will provide an anchor point for Editor's client-side scripts. Client / server communication is required in order to provide the initial data for the DataTable and then for Editor to instruct the server to create, edit or delete rows as required by the end user. The PHP libraries can do this for you in just a few lines. Read more »
NodeJS libraries
As part of Editor, we publish Node.JS libraries to provide everything needed Editor and DataTables on the server-side for full support of create, read, update and delete actions. This section of the manual details how those libraries can be utilised in your Node application. Read more »
Plug-in development
Editor is designed from its core up to be modular and completely customisable. Its API provides a lot of options for control over the form, but the contents in of the form and how the form is actually displayed can be modified to suit your exact needs. This section of the documentation explains in detail how you can add custom field types and display controllers to Editor. Read more »