# DataTables example Child Rows

This example shows how it is possible to integrate child rows with StateRestore by adding a listener for the `requestChild`.

The DataTables API has a number of methods for attaching child rows to a row in the DataTable. This can be used to show additional information about a row, useful for cases where you wish to convey more information about a row than there is space for in the host table.

Here the `row().child()` api method is used to display each row stored in the state when the `requestChild` event is triggered.

| Name | Position | Office | Salary
--- | --- | --- | --- | ---
| Name | Position | Office | Salary

- Javascript
- HTML
- CSS
- Ajax
- Server-side script

The Javascript shown below is used to initialise the table shown in this example:

`// Formatting function for row details - modify as you need function format(d) { // `d` is the original data object for the row return ( '<dl>' + '<dt>Full name:</dt>' + '<dd>' + d.name + '</dd>' + '<dt>Extension number:</dt>' + '<dd>' + d.extn + '</dd>' + '<dt>Extra info:</dt>' + '<dd>And any further details here (images etc)...</dd>' + '</dl>' ); } var table = $('#example').DataTable({ ajax: '../data/objects.txt', columns: [ { className: 'dt-control', orderable: false, data: null, defaultContent: '' }, { data: 'name' }, { data: 'position' }, { data: 'office' }, { data: 'salary' } ], layout: { topStart: { buttons: ['createState', 'savedStates'] } }, order: [[1, 'asc']], rowId: 'id' }); // State handling for restoring child rows table.on('requestChild', function (e, row) { row.child(format(row.data())).show(); }); // Add event listener for opening and closing details table.on('click', 'tbody td.dt-control', function () { var tr = $(this).closest('tr'); var row = table.row(tr); if (row.child.isShown()) { // This row is already open - close it row.child.hide(); } else { // Open this row row.child(format(row.data())).show(); } });`
`// Formatting function for row details - modify as you need function format(d) { // `d` is the original data object for the row return ( '<dl>' + '<dt>Full name:</dt>' + '<dd>' + d.name + '</dd>' + '<dt>Extension number:</dt>' + '<dd>' + d.extn + '</dd>' + '<dt>Extra info:</dt>' + '<dd>And any further details here (images etc)...</dd>' + '</dl>' ); } let table = new DataTable('#example', { ajax: '../data/objects.txt', columns: [ { className: 'dt-control', orderable: false, data: null, defaultContent: '' }, { data: 'name' }, { data: 'position' }, { data: 'office' }, { data: 'salary' } ], layout: { topStart: { buttons: ['createState', 'savedStates'] } }, order: [[1, 'asc']], rowId: 'id' }); // State handling for restoring child rows table.on('requestChild', function (e, row) { row.child(format(row.data())).show(); }); // Add event listener for opening and closing details table.on('click', 'tbody td.dt-control', function (e) { let tr = e.target.closest('tr'); let row = table.row(tr); if (row.child.isShown()) { // This row is already open - close it row.child.hide(); } else { // Open this row row.child(format(row.data())).show(); } });`

In addition to the above code, the following Javascript library files are loaded for use in this example:

The HTML shown below is the raw HTML table element, before it has been enhanced by DataTables:

This example uses a little bit of additional CSS beyond what is loaded from the library files (below), in order to correctly display the table. The additional CSS used is shown below:

`td.details-control { background: url('../resources/details_open.png') no-repeat center center; cursor: pointer; } tr.shown td.details-control { background: url('../resources/details_close.png') no-repeat center center; }`

The following CSS library files are loaded for use in this example to provide the styling of the table:

This table loads data by Ajax. The latest data that has been loaded is shown below. This data will update automatically as any additional data is loaded.

The script used to perform the server-side processing for this table is shown below. Please note that this is just an example script using PHP. Server-side processing scripts can be written in any language, using the protocol described in the DataTables documentation.