jqgrid subgrids from a single nested json

Question

I want to use jqgrid with nested subgrids. However, the only examples I've found populate the main grid with one url load-data call and separate calls to populate the subgrids.

My subgrid data exist as nested documents in one JSON structure, as shown in the snippet below (I want chapters to appear as subgrids of the book, and files to be subgrids within chapters).

Can I create subgrids from nested JSON documents with jqgrid?

{
  _id: {"509403957ae7d3929edcb812"},
  name: {"MYBOOK"},
  layout: {
        chapters [
           {
              name: "myfirstchapter",
              sequence: 1,
              title: "My First Chapter",
              files: [
                 {
                 filetype: "tex",
                 name: "myfirstfile"
                 },
                 {
                 filetype: "tmpl",
                 name: "myfileb",
                 }
              ],

           },
           {
              name: "mysecondchapter",
              sequence: 2,
              title: "My Second Chapter",
              files: [
                 {
                 filetype: "tex",
                 name: "myintro"
                 },
                 {
                 filetype: "tex",
                 name: "myfilec",
                 }
              ],

           ],
        }
}

Solution

I made the demo which demonstrate how to do this:

The demo are based on the idea described here and on the fact that internal data option saves the input data in unmodified form. So you don't need to create some hidden columns to save additional information associated with the row. See the answer and this one for more details. I strictly recommend you additionally to use idPrefix option in subgrids. See the answer for details.

Below in the code which I used in the demo:

var myData = {
        _id: "509403957ae7d3929edcb812",
        name: "MYBOOK",
        layout: {
            chapters: [
                {
                    name: "myfirstchapter",
                    sequence: 1,
                    title: "My First Chapter",
                    files: [
                        { filetype: "tex", name: "myfirstfile" },
                        { filetype: "tmpl", name: "myfileb" }
                    ]
                },
                {
                    name: "mysecondchapter",
                    sequence: 2,
                    title: "My Second Chapter",
                    files: [
                        { filetype: "tex", name: "myintro" },
                        { filetype: "tex", name: "myfilec" }
                    ]
                }
            ]
        }
    },
    $grid = $("#list");

$grid.jqGrid({
    datatype: "local",
    data: myData.layout.chapters,
    colNames: ["Sequence", "Name", "Title"],
    colModel: [
        {name: "sequence", width: 65, key: true },
        {name: "name", width: 150 },
        {name: "title", width: 150}
    ],
    rowNum: 10,
    rowList: [5, 10, 20],
    pager: "#pager",
    gridview: true,
    ignoreCase: true,
    rownumbers: true,
    sortname: "sequence",
    viewrecords: true,
    height: "100%",
    subGrid: true,
    subGridRowExpanded: function (subgridId, rowid) {
        var subgridTableId = subgridId + "_t";
        $("#" + subgridId).html("<table id='" + subgridTableId + "'></table>");
        $("#" + subgridTableId).jqGrid({
            datatype: "local",
            data: $(this).jqGrid("getLocalRow", rowid).files,
            colNames: ["Name", "Filetype"],
            colModel: [
              {name: "name", width: 130, key: true},
              {name: "filetype", width: 130}
            ],
            height: "100%",
            rowNum: 10,
            sortname: "name",
            idPrefix: "s_" + rowid + "_"
        });
    }
});
$grid.jqGrid("navGrid", "#pager", {add: false, edit: false, del: false});

In the above code I fixed some syntax errors from the data which you posted.