Text editor for MEL? Whats the best free one?

[pen-1]

I have noticed that Maya has no editor for MEL script. it has the script editor but every time you eval the code it disappears to the upper window. So what is the best free code editor that does highlighting out there?

[gdc]

There's a bunch of them. I'd try a few out and see what works best for you. I like gvim. If you come from the *nix world it's great and free and runs on about every OS out there.

I'm sure other people will post there fav's.

--g

[pen-1]

Thanks for the reply. Anyone else have any that they use. Does gvim colour code the script properly?

[gdc]

yes, gvim has syntax highlighting for MEL, C, C++ and many others.

--g

[pen-1]

I am unable to find that tool on any of the sites. Is that the full name for it?

[gdc]

http://www.vim.org/download.php

gvim is graphical version of vim which is an improved version of vi...

Any that's the download page.

--g

[joojaa]

Yes well i use old and trusty emacs for this, you just dont get better editor capabilities than this. But on the otherhand starting to use emacs is quirky at best.

[pen-1]

I don't even know what an emac is, I don't think I want to as well.

It is a pain that Maya doesn't have a built in editor that does the basics at least.

[macaronikazoo]

textpad.com is what i use. its quite cool... having said that, I've never really used anything else, so its not exactly a well rounded opinion.

[tawnkramer]

Crimson editor is a cool editor that is free. It does source highlighting of MEL if you download the proper files from this site. I love the ability to edit files over ftp as if they were local. Great for my network programming work.

I tried the Melanie application because it purported to have MEL interface design - but I ended using it's color coded editor instead. It seemed to be more intelligent about highlighting than Crimson Editor ( because it was made for MEL I suppose.)

But I do most of my coding in Microsuck Visual C++ and it ended up being convenient to edit there as well because I keep my scripts in source safe - and it's all integrated. So there are highlighting files for this as well - but it's not free.

Also, it ended up being an issue to me that the editor have easy/fast ablity to jump a given line number because the MEL errors have useful line numbers. So I dropped Melanie for the reason. Crimson Editor and MSVC are both fine for that.

my 2 cents.

-Tawn

[jeffd]

I use and like UltraEdit. Syntax highlighting files are available here on highend.

--JeffD

[pen-1]

This is all good stuff. I haven't had to use an external editor for scripting before so this is a bit new to me. I think I am going with Crimson Editor as I know some one here that has used it and I now have the colour coding for it. Thanks for all the help guys.

[joojaa]

What i personaly love about emacs is tha fact that i can edit code then once the change is there i can issue inside emacs so that maya sources the file immidiately without leaving emacs. Kindof like running the test directly inside maya.

and offcourse color couding is cool... But less usefull that auto indenting and error cheking.

And offcourse emacs is free...

[ck41]

What i personaly love about emacs is tha fact that i can edit code
then once the change is there i can issue inside emacs so that
maya sources the file immidiately without leaving emacs.
Kindof like running the test directly inside maya.

Can you explain little more? Do you mean you don't need to source
the edited script somehow?

thanks,
-ck

[joojaa]

When i launch emacs from within maya i also open a command port at the same time. Now emacs can be made to talk into any port so if i need a code fragment run then i ask it to send the data there. If i need the code sourced i send it evaled in and bang whtever im working on splashes to the screen without needing to leave emacs for a second.

Now after the basics are coded with lisp in (plenty of simple examples of this available in the world) i assign theese commands to some keyboard shortcut and in no time its hardwired to my brain like a automatic function.

[ck41]

Thanks for explaining Joojaa!

I don't know how i can eval things over sockets with emacs... I'll try to look for more from basics.
( If you feel to give me some direction, would be really appriciate =) )
Anyway, this sounds really neat if i can.

[alnitak]

hi all,

just to know this tip: if u select all (ctrl+a) in the script editor and the run it with enter in numeric keypad, the souce isnt deleted

regards

[joojaa]

Yup, the feature is decribed in the manual. You dont even need to source the entire script enter just runs the selected part.

[bentneuron]

I may look like a newbie by asking this but what the heck is an "emac"?

-bN

[bentneuron]

I really like Blue MEL Studio, which is a MEL editor that's totally integrated into Maya...a sort of replacement, very enhanced version of the Script Editor.

Have a look if you like:

http://www.maxliani.com/technology/BlueMelStudio\_MainEn.html

-bN