jQuery DataTables - Refactoring Code to remove 'aoColumn' duplication

Question

I'm using jQuery DataTables to render a timeline and each column represents a day. I have a method that is called when each column (day) is rendered and it's passed in a date from an array.

Is there a better way to write the code below so that i'm not repeating myself 7 times whilst still being able to pass in the array item? I cannot see anything that stands out in the docs.

dataTable = $('#example').dataTable({
"bRetrieve":true,
"bProcessing":true,
"aaData": data,
// DataTables requires a render function for each column (day)
"aoColumns":[
    {
        "mData":null,
        "fnRender":function (obj) {
            return day(obj, week[0]);
        }
    },
    {
        "mData":null,
        "fnRender":function (obj) {
            return day(obj, week[1]);
        }
    },
    {
        "mData":null,
        "fnRender":function (obj) {
            return day(obj, week[2]);
        }
    },
    {
        "mData":null,
        "fnRender":function (obj) {
            return day(obj, week[3]);
        }
    },
    {
        "mData":null,
        "fnRender":function (obj) {
            return day(obj, week[4]);
        }
    },
    {
        "mData":null,
        "fnRender":function (obj) {
            return day(obj, week[5]);
        }
    },
    {
        "mData":null,
        "fnRender":function (obj) {
            return day(obj, week[6]);
        }
    }
]

});

Answer 1

Here is a simple solution, using $.map() :

dataTable = $("#example").dataTable({
    bRetrieve: true,
    bProcessing: true,
    aaData: data,
    aoColumns: $.map(Array(7), function(value, index) {
        return {
            mData: null,
            fnRender: function(obj) {
                return day(obj, week[index]);
            }
        };
    })
});

In the code above, Array(7) creates a sparse array of seven elements (indexed 0 to 6 ), all set to undefined . Then, $.map() projects object literals from the indices in that array. The result is an array of object literals with the second argument to day() varying with the current index.