Ah, forgive the newbie, I got it. just after posting the question.

the correct snippet is below, check the maroon colored text.

        var mystr = "<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?> <myroot>  <myrow> <column1>data1</column1> <column2>data2</column2> </myrow> </myroot> ";
        jQuery(document).ready(function() {
        jQuery("#list").jqGrid({
                datatype: 'xmlstring',
                datastr: mystr,
                colNames: ['Inv No', 'Date'],
                colModel: [
                    { name: 'invid', index: 'invid', width: 55, xmlmap: "column1" },
                    { name: 'invdate', index: 'invdate', width: 90, xmlmap: "column2"}],
                pager: jQuery('#pager'),
                rowNum: 10,
                viewrecords: true, repeatitems: false,
                imgpath: 'themes/basic/images',
                caption: 'My first grid',
                loadonce: true,
                xmlReader: { root : "myroot", row: "myrow", repeatitems: false}
            });
        });

   Does anybody know whats wrong with the snippet below, I;m working with XMLstring , I copied the sample from the jqgriddocs.pdf and it works fine. But when I rename the <rows> , <row> or <cell> it stops working.

I already specified the root, row, and xmlmap but to no avail.

it seems only the default datastructure is the only one that works.

<rows><row><cell></cell></row></rows>

please see code snippet below:

    <script type="text/javascript">
        var mystr = "<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?> <myroot>  <myrow> <column1>data1</column1> <column2>data2</column2> </myrow> </myroot> ";

        jQuery(document).ready(function() {
        jQuery("#list").jqGrid({
                root: "myroot",   
                datatype: 'xmlstring',
                datastr: mystr,
                colNames: ['Inv No', 'Date'],
                colModel: [
                    { name: 'invid', index: 'invid', width: 55,  xmlmap: "column1" },
                    { name: 'invdate', index: 'invdate', width: 90, xmlmap: "column2"}],
                pager: jQuery('#pager'),
                rowNum: 10,
                viewrecords: true, repeatitems: false,
                imgpath: 'themes/basic/images',
                caption: 'My first grid'
            });
        });
    </script>