Hey guys,
I was thinking how to develop plugins for Maya… and can any1 give me some idea about the MLL file format?.. is it the same as DLL files with its extention changed?.. i have experience with VisualBasic 6 programming. Is it possible to develop maya plugin with VB? Any help, link or information will be highly appriciated.
You have to use c++. On windows only visual studio is supported by autodesk I think, although you could use the free mingw compiler.
And yes, .mll is just a .dll with a different extension. Maya comes with wizards for visual studio that set up your project properly for you.
an mll is just a dll with a different extension. You need to use C++, and it needs to be Visual C++. No other compiler is going to work (on windows). As for how to write plugins, check my site linked in my sig.
Robert - is there a recommended order to your tutorials or do I just follow them from top to bottom?
also where is the MObject tutorial?
thanks for making these - it seems really hard to find any proper documentation on the Maya API.
having just made my first Hello World MPxCommand plugin, i’m pretty excited and got the coding bug again…
…ok off to learn some more…
Another question for anyone using the Maya API:
how did you guys learn how to use it? Were there any good tutorials/courses etc or was it mostly trial/error, scouring the API docs, picking up tips/instruction on the job?
I have been through Rob’s tutorials and the hohehohe (??) one. I am sure i’ll work it out as I start building my plugins but it would be nice to get some additional help - especially around working with particles and dynamics.
cheers
Holly
To get started, David Gould’s Complete Maya Programming books are good, moreso the first one than the second. After that, one of the best resources available are the example plugins included with the devkit. You won’t get much instruction on how they work, but with enough playing around, and with a careful enough look through maya’s dag network, you should be able to pick them apart by yourself. That’s how I’ve learned most of what I know with the API.
nope. I just used to jump around a lot when giving lectures, so i tried to keep them smallish.
also where is the MObject tutorial?
Missing in action i guess 
thanks for making these - it seems really hard to find any proper documentation on the Maya API.
It’s documented very well, it just doesn’t make any sense
how did you guys learn how to use it? Were there any good tutorials/courses etc or was it mostly trial/error, scouring the API docs, picking up tips/instruction on the job?
I spent about five years banging my head against the wall screaming. Eventually it started to make sense When i was learning it there were no resources anywhere other than the Maya help, which i didn’t find that useful for a beginner (which is why i wrote the tuts on my site).
… especially around working with particles and dynamics.
don’t expect to find too much material about that in the API. If you know maya’s particles and dynamics, then it should be a case of just learning how Maya API does things. Once you get the hang of how the API is structured, then most other things follow the same pattern.
Solid understanding of C++ and modern Graphic API’s is of great help when learning how to use Maya API. Lots of people tend to skip learning C++ fully and later gets problem understanding different C++ based API’s.
It’s also a very good idea to get familiar with your build evironment, like Visual C++. It will save you a lot of time when starting out developing plugins for Maya.
First go through the different steps in, Developer Resources/ API Guide. It will learn you the basic stuff and the workflow, also see the devkit examples for more code examples.
The documentation also contains API Classes Reference, MEL Commands and Nodes and Attributes which is helpful.
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