Simple(?) MEL Script

jStins

I am attempting to write what I assume is a pretty simple mel script to achieve this behavior:

• Select shortest edge path based on current selection of two verts
• Switch to edge component mode
• Set selected edges to hard

I got as far as finding this: polySelect -shortestEdgePath 10 100 pPlane1;, but got stuck trying to query the selected verts / object. I can get vertex numbers using string $objects[]=`ls -sl -fl`;, but cant sort out how to use those values in the -shortestEdgePath command. I'd be grateful for any assistance.

I'd also appreciate any recommendations on good resources for learning mel script. I don't want to go full tech artist, but I'm finding myself more and more frustrated with repetitive tasks / key strokes. I'd love to learn enough to automate simple, repetitive tasks. Thanks!

Klaudio2U

Here it is a quick one. Probably could be done better and with fewer lines but....
Just select two vertices and run the script, should work:

// get two selected vertices

string $compSel[]= `ls -sl -fl`;

// get object name 

string $objSel[] = `ls -hilite`;

// get  the number of first sel vertice

string $buffer1[];

$numTokens1 = `tokenize $compSel[0] ".[]" $buffer1`;

print $buffer1[$numTokens1 -1]; // print last item in array

    // make number as int 

    int $firstVert = $buffer1[$numTokens1 -1];

// get number of second selected vertice

string $buffer2[];

$numTokens2 = `tokenize $compSel[1] ".[]" $buffer2`;

    // make number as int 

    int $secondVert = $buffer2[$numTokens2 -1];

// enter edge selection mode

dR_DoCmd("modeEdge");

// clear selected edges - if there is any from before

select -cl;

// select the path

polySelect -shortestEdgePath $firstVert $secondVert $objSel[0];

// make edges hard

SoftPolyEdgeElements 0;

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jStins

Awesome! Thanks @Klaudio2U. The script works and the comments are really helpful in giving me more to dig into. Cheers! 

throttlekitty

I don't know about the others, but I've learned the most from reading through the docs and taking apart scripts that others have written. And a lot of googling and reading old forum threads, looking for similar solutions or suggestions like: "Oh you want to [thing]? Try doing [keyword to research further] like this..."

Klaudio2U

Glad you find it useful.

For learning basically this:

 throttlekitty said:
I don't know about the others, but I've learned the most from reading through the docs and taking apart scripts that others have written. And a lot of googling and reading old forum threads, looking for similar solutions or suggestions like: "Oh you want to [thing]? Try doing [keyword to research further] like this..."

The best way is to have some sort of a project, script you want to do and then llearn how to do it by google it around with "maya mel.....". 
The book are ok to look a bit but i didn't find it super useful so just check YouTube and/or Vimeo instead.