Get unique column values when column contains html

oleksiy

This is exactly the same question as closed discussion here, just that I'm trying to use the new api methods from the example for 1.10+. So far, I was able to manage how to strip html for the drop-down options, but sort and unique methods do not provide the right values because of html tags in the values.
column.data().unique().sort().each( function ( d, j ) { select.append( '<option value="'+d.replace(/(<([^>]+)>)/ig,"")+'">'+d.replace(/(<([^>]+)>)/ig,"")+'</option>' )