Error in DataSource for Telerik MVC DropDownTree - telerik

Question

My Telerik MVC Dropdowntree reports the error "Object doesn't support property or method 'level'" for the datasource.
Can someone take a look below and tell me what's wrong?
The MVC looks like this
#(Html.Kendo().DropDownTree()
.Name("dropdowntree")
.DataTextField("Name")
.DataValueField("Id")
.HtmlAttributes(new { style = "width: 100%" })
.DataSource(dataSource => dataSource
.Read(read => read
.Action("DoLayers2", "Dev")
)
)
)
My controller returns the following JSON:
[
{
"Id":1,
"ParentCategoryId":0,
"Name":"First Layer",
"items":[
{
"Id":2,
"ParentCategoryId":1,
"Name":"First SubLayer1",
"items":[
]
},
{
"Id":3,
"ParentCategoryId":1,
"Name":"First SubLayer2",
"items":[
]
},
{
"Id":4,
"ParentCategoryId":1,
"Name":"First SubLayer3",
"items":[
]
}
]
},
{
"Id":5,
"ParentCategoryId":0,
"Name":"Second Layer",
"items":[
{
"Id":6,
"ParentCategoryId":5,
"Name":"Second SubLayer1",
"items":[
]
},
{
"Id":7,
"ParentCategoryId":5,
"Name":"Second SubLayer2",
"items":[
{
"Id":8,
"ParentCategoryId":7,
"Name":"Sub -3",
"items":[
]
}
]
}
]
}
]
Apparently my post has too much code and not enough details so I have to write something foolish at the end of the post to trick the system into allowing me to post it. This is rather annoying.

Answer 1

I'm not sure you can return the whole tree and bind it to the dropdowntree...
If you check telerik's demo you see that they only returns one level at a time, so In your case I think it only wants first level Id:1 and Id:5 at first and then it will automatically ask for second level for each branch...
(Id:1 will return 2, 3, 4 and Id:5 will return 6, 7 and Id:7 will return 8)
You will also have to return if there are any children for each node:
[
{ "Id":1, "Name":"First Layer", "hasChildren": true },
{ "Id":5, "Name":"Second Layer", "hasChildren": true }
]
Hope it helps!