Currently, the list builder does not have the AJAX functionality you're looking for. That said, I've done some work using YUI's Datatable widget (See
http://developer.yahoo.com/yui/examples/datatable/index.html) as a list template (replacing table.adp), and I've also created a version of file-storage's folder-chunk that does the AJAX pagination and sorting. Extending that to inline cell-editing would be pretty trivial, as well.
Unfortunately, the work I've done really works around the list builder and doesn't really accomplish the goal you're hoping for (global integration of these features) because the code is page/package specific, however, I believe it has the potential to be put us significantly closer to that result.
To make the list builder do everything required, there are essentially two pieces missing: A mechanism to define the external data source (usually JSON), and a mechanism to define more properties for columns, such as sortablity, visibilty, data type, cell editor to use, etc.
Long story short: the bad news is that this isn't not currently possible, but the good news is that we (particularly Dave Bauer, Ryan Gallimore and me) have been discussing AJAX integration in OpenACS pretty extensively over the last few months and if those plans are achieved, the feature you're requesting will occur naturally.