DataTables for Formidableby Jones Web Designs
Documentation

Build, style, ship.

Everything you need to go from a Formidable form to a beautiful, editable table on your site.

01Installation

From your purchase email:

  1. Download the datatables-for-formidable.zip link.
  2. In WordPress: Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin. Upload the zip and click Install Now.
  3. Activate.
  4. Go to DataTables → License and paste the license key from the same email.

Formidable Forms (free or Pro) must be active. If it isn’t, you’ll see a banner reminding you to install it. In-place updates arrive automatically via Dashboard → Updates.

02Building a table

Open DataTables → Add New. The builder is a split screen — controls on the left, a live preview on the right that mirrors the front end exactly.

  • Source — name the table and pick the Formidable form.
  • Columns — drag fields in (or click +), drag to reorder, set a default sort, or flag a column to live in the responsive child row.
  • Features — toggle DataTables features, paging, row-click behaviour, and the Actions column.
  • Theme — preset, density, alignment, colours, and custom CSS.
  • Embed — copy the shortcode or share the public URL.

The preview updates live as you edit — no save required. Use the Desktop / Mobile toggle to see the full desktop layout scaled to fit, or the real phone-width responsive view in a device frame.

03Shortcode & public page

Each saved table gets a shortcode — drop it in any post, page, or Formidable View:

[dtff_table id="3"]

Every table also has a standalone, sharable public page (when its status is Active):

https://your-site.com/dtff/your-table-slug/

Inside the Formidable Views editor you’ll find a DataTables sidebar listing every table for one-click shortcode copy.

04DataTables features

Toggle each per-table in the Features tab. The asset loader only enqueues what a page actually uses.

  • Global search, column sort, pagination, and the info row
  • Buttons — Copy · CSV · Excel · PDF · Print · Column Visibility
  • Responsive — automatic breakpoints with inline, control-column, or modal child rows
  • SearchPanes — faceted filter panes with counts
  • SearchBuilder — visual AND / OR query builder
  • FixedHeader · FixedColumns — sticky header; freeze the first column(s)
  • ColReorder · RowReorder — drag to reorder columns or rows
  • RowGroup — group rows under a heading by any column
  • Scroller — virtual scrolling for very large tables
  • Select · KeyTable — row/cell selection; keyboard navigation
  • StateRestore — save & reload named filter / sort / search views
  • Row click — do nothing, expand a child row, or open the full entry in a modal

05Styling & presets

The front-end CSS is fully self-contained and theme-proof — your tables look identical on any WordPress theme. Tune everything in the Theme tab:

  • Style presets — Default, Minimal, Striped, Bordered, Dark
  • Density — comfortable, compact, or spacious
  • Alignment — header and cell content left, center, or right
  • Colour customizer — accent, text, borders, header, rows, zebra striping, hover, toolbar — each its own control
  • Radius & font size, plus a per-table custom CSS box (scoped to that table so it can’t leak)

06Editing data (add / edit / delete)

Turn on the Actions column and Add entry button in the Features tab to manage Formidable entries straight from the table.

  • Add / Edit open a modal that embeds the real Formidable form — every field type, conditional logic, calculations, and validation work natively.
  • Delete removes the entry through Formidable’s own API after a confirmation.

Permissions mirror Formidable exactly: controls only appear for users with the matching frm_create_entries / frm_edit_entries / frm_delete_entries capability. Anonymous visitors get a read-only table. Front-end editing of existing entries uses Formidable Pro’s edit mode.

07Custom PDF reports

Generate your own designed PDFs — no Formidable PDF add-on required. Under DataTables → PDF Reports → New report, build the document in a visual, no-code builder:

  • Pick a form or an existing Formidable View as the data source, then add elements: a repeating header & footer, logo / images, headings, text, fields (the entry's data), data tables (selected rows), signatures, dividers, and page breaks.
  • Reorder elements, set page size / orientation / accent / fonts, and watch the live PDF preview update as you go.

Turn an existing View into a PDF. Choose Data source → A Formidable View, pick your View (the picker lists both Formidable Views and Formidable Canvas views, labelled by source), and click Build from View. Multi-form Canvas views become one table per form, each pulling its own entries. It mirrors the View's columns — including calculated columns — into a heading + table you can customize: rename, remove, reorder or add columns, and style the header/logo/page. Each table column can be a form field or a custom Formidable expression (e.g. [frm-math][25] * [30][/frm-math] or [frm-stats]), evaluated per row exactly the way the View renders it.

To download: [dtff_pdf_button view="123"] on any page exports the whole View (honouring its filters & sort); [dtff_pdf_button template="…" entry="[id]"] inside a View row exports a single entry. Both are in the view editor's shortcode helper menu. You can also still add a standalone Calc / Formidable element anywhere in the document.

Filter which entries appear. The builder's Filter entries section saves always-on conditions (e.g. Status is Open, Price greater or equal 500000) so the report only includes matching entries. Add as many as you like — they combine with AND, and an empty list includes everything. These author filters are separate from any front-end filtering a visitor does, and stack on top of a Formidable View's own filters.

For tables, in the table's Features tab choose that report as the PDF report button. Each row gets a one-click Generate PDF; turn on Row selection and you also get a PDF selected button to pick any rows on the front end and generate the report on the fly.

08Field types & smart cells

Every Formidable field renders as readable text, and several get special treatment automatically:

  • Images — image and logo/photo URL columns render as thumbnails (even URLs without a file extension), centered, opening in a full-screen lightbox.
  • Files — non-image files show a file-type chip linking to the document.
  • Email & phone — auto-link to mailto: / tel:.
  • Addresses — link out to Google Maps.

Anything unrecognised displays as sanitised plain text.

09Permissions

Entry actions are governed by Formidable’s own capability system, so whatever you’ve configured in Formidable carries straight through:

  • Add — requires frm_create_entries
  • Edit — requires frm_edit_entries
  • Delete — requires frm_delete_entries

Administrators always qualify. Delete runs through a nonce-protected REST endpoint, so it can’t be triggered without a valid, capable session.

10Support

An active license includes support — send us a message and you'll hear back within one business day.

Bug reports get priority. Feature requests get a thoughtful reply — and often end up on the changelog.