New: The object returned by $.ajax is assigned to jqXHR in the table's settings object now. This means that you can access the XHR in fnDrawCallback (or any of the other callback functions, or anything with access to the settings object!) to do further data manipulation if you wish.

media/js/jquery.dataTables.js

@@ -1319,13 +1319,21 @@
 			 */
 			this.bAjaxDataGet = true;
 			
+			/*
+			 * Variable: jqXHR
+			 * Purpose:  The last jQuery XHR object that was used for server-side data gathering. 
+			 *           This can be used for working with the XHR information in one of the callbacks
+			 * Scope:    jQuery.dataTable.classSettings
+			 */
+			this.jqXHR = null;
+			
 			/*
 			 * Variable: fnServerData
 			 * Purpose:  Function to get the server-side data - can be overruled by the developer
 			 * Scope:    jQuery.dataTable.classSettings
 			 */
-			this.fnServerData = function ( url, data, callback ) {
-				$.ajax( {
+			this.fnServerData = function ( url, data, callback, settings ) {
+				settings.jqXHR = $.ajax( {
 					"url": url,
 					"data": data,
 					"success": callback,
@@ -2412,7 +2420,7 @@
 					
 					_fnProcessingDisplay( oSettings, false );
 					_fnInitComplete( oSettings, json );
-				} );
+				}, oSettings );
 				return;
 			}
 			
@@ -3473,7 +3481,7 @@
 				oSettings.fnServerData.call( oSettings.oInstance, oSettings.sAjaxSource, aoData,
 					function(json) {
 						_fnAjaxUpdateDraw( oSettings, json );
-					} );
+					}, oSettings );
 				return false;
 			}
 			else