Does Maya Mel have a good API to a IDE ?

Question

Hi,

I'm developing in MAYA and looking for a good API to connect my models and to be able to control them programatically.

thanks.

Answer 1

hye oded, you can use MEL or python scripting for control objects and doing simple actions, and you can use the c++ or Python via maya api to create complex tasks or heavy duty tasks, like creating deformers, expanding mel with new commands.

for resources in mel scripting i recommend "gnomon Mel fundemental" video tutor

and for the api i recommend "Complete Maya Programming" book

if you could do any scripting or api programming and you know some python, you can easily program/script with python which is way easier than mel or c++

hope that will help you :D

Answer 2

There are a couple of apps for mel programming, but all they do is give you syntax coloring and maybe autocomplete. Nothing more advanced exists, which is just as well, because mel is just a terrible, terrible language: It really isnt good for anything other than quick hacks in Maya's script editor. You definitively should use Python.

You can use an external IDE, like Eclipse or WingIDE to control Maya, but it's tricky http://www.wingware.com/doc/howtos/maya

Whether youll be doing Python scripting or API development, definitively have a look at PyMel, which is a vast improvment over Maya's native Pyhon implementation.