<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<dt-api group="utility">
	<name>toArray()</name>
	<summary>Create a native Javascript array object from an API instance.</summary>
	<since>1.10</since>

	<type type="function">
		<signature>toArray()</signature>
		<description>Create a native Javascript array from an API instance.</description>
		<returns type="array">Javascript array which contains the values from the API instance's result set.</returns>
	</type>

	<description>
		The DataTables API object provides a lot of the methods that you would expect to find in a native Javascript array and generally acts a lot like an array, but there are times when you want to work directly with a Javascript array rather than a DataTables API instance. This method can be used to create a native Javascript array which contains the same items as contained in the API instance's result set.

		This method makes use of the fact that DataTables API objects are "array like", in that they inherent a lot of the abilities and methods of the Javascript `Array` type.
	</description>

	<example title="Get a plain array of data from a column"><![CDATA[
var table = $('#example').DataTable();

var plainArray = table
	.column( 0 )
	.data()
	.toArray();

]]></example>

</dt-api>