I wanted something similar to question 5 a while back, but as I was dealing with already-worked-on scenes it was not feasible to call an existing material slot, a new material had to be created, and it also could not be placed in a slot after the fact (didn't want to over-write anything). Anyway, I can't take full credit…
To get the material maxscript working you can record the actions with the max script listener (lower right corner, right click the pink box and choose open listener), under macro recorder, enable everything. Then preform your actions and see what kind of code it spits out. for me when I assign a material to slot 1 in the…
If you can be fussed you could setup a callback to apply this material on object creation. I'm sure there was such a script floating around but I cannot yet put my finger on it... Aha! it was the wonderful PEN - Paul Neale, 3ds max rigging guru: http://www.penproductions.ca/scripts/autoMaterial/autoMaterial.htm Take a look!
I also recommend Outliner, you can pick it up on scriptspot.com. It's dockable and puts the the layer manager & scene explore to shame. It also operates pretty much like Maya's outliner which is how it got started. I can't work without it, I love the layer nesting feature.