The JQuery DataTables plugin supports state saving for column filters. But it does not automatically set the column filter values to the saved values when the user navigates to a page that has saved filter state.

I saw the code suggested here and cleaned it up a little (for example, using the oSettings parameter of the fnInitComplete function).

$(document).ready(function() {

        var oTable = $('#REPLACE_THIS_WITH_TABLE_ID').dataTable({
            "bStateSave": true,
            "fnInitComplete": function(oSettings, json) {
                var cols = oSettings.aoPreSearchCols;
                for (var i = 0; i < cols.length; i++) {
                    var value = cols[i].sSearch;
                    if (value.length > 0) {
                        $("tfoot input")[i].value = value;
                    }
                }
            }
        });

        $("tfoot input").keyup(function () {
            oTable.fnFilter(this.value, $("tfoot input").index(this));
        });
    });

Please note that I completely removed all code that supported initial display texts in the filter fields (because I don’t use that).