Max scripts to MEL

[jtk77]

A freind of mine who is a "Weekend" programmer told me that converting Max scripts to MEL shouldn;t be that hard to do . Just have to change what tools it thinks it can use for Maya ones. And shcnge how the code reads . Is any of this true. ? Can we get hold of max scripts and fairly easily rip them off into MEL ?
thought I'd ask since I'm NOT a programmer at all. Seems like this would be happing more often if it really was that easy . thanks for any input.

.............

[scifiwasabi]

Hmmm. Within the past week I just started visiting the Maxscript support pages at discreet in search of algorithms and other useful tools that I might want in Maya. It really depends on what scripts you are converting. For example, scripting polygon modeling tools in Maya is almost a waste of time.

Been a long while since I've used Max but I think the big hurdles in converting Maxscript to Mel would be the fact that Maxscript is object oriented. Also, Maxscript seems to be able to handle a whole lot more events whereas MEL only directly supports ctl, shift, leftMouse, and middleMouse events as well as the events that scriptJob can handle. Because of this, you can build a lot of interactive tools complete with cusom manipulators in Maxscript while in MEL, you have to work in the confines of the few provided Contexts which are not as flexible.

BTW, I've noticed how many Nichimen Mirai polygon tools are being "ported" to MAX via Maxscript. Trying to do that in MEL is a pain in the ass.

[claforte]

That's interesting information, scifiwasabi...

Just curious, do you have experience developping Maya plugins? If so, how would you compare plug-in development between 3DSMAX and Maya? (Don't worry, I don't take criticism personally so be honest.

Christian

Software Engineer,
Alias|Wavefront

[ame]

Hello,

will be very nice to be able to create cusrom manipulator in Maya, and be able to connect the value from a manipulator to an attribute.

MEL need more "on screen" support, I would like to be able to create floatting sliders (like Max 4 and Messiah), and be able to print information on view ports (like the the Heads on display).

Another really cool improvement will be the ability ro create NODEs with MEL so I can create custom fuctionlity, like VEX in houdini or ScriptedOps in XSI.
A Shading Lenguage will be great too.

Maya needs some major improvements on the script area they need to add some of the functionality that other package have now (like Max 4 and XSI).
MEL is very powerfull and easy to use but right now have some limitation, will be nice to be able to use other lenguage like PERL and JAVA inside maya.

And please add something like the NETVIEW that could help the datamanagment quite a bit.

I have logged many of this requests in the past, but so far nothing has been implemented and seems that other packages start to have what maya should have a already. I loged this functionality arround verion 1.5.........

Write a plug-ins is not always a solution, script are easier to manage and do not require to be compiled!

thanks for your time,

-A.

[ame]

Hello me again,

some examples of MAX scripting that will be very nice to see implemente in MAYA:

http://www.gfxcentral.com/bobo/mxs4/

take a look, there is some fuctionality that are needed to make users happy and able to creater easier setup. Sometimes you don't want to have tons of floatting windows arround..... manipulars and onscreen informations is one way to go.

You can also take a look at:

http://www.projectmessiah.com/x2/products/...enshot\_full.jpg

and

http://www.projectmessiah.com/x2/news\_main.htm#15best

Manipulator need an option to show numerical feedback too!

Bye, and thx for your time

-a

Edited by ame on 03/15/01 03:36:33 PM.