What this book covers

Chapter 1, Introspecting Maya, Python, and PyMEL, explores how Maya and Python work individually and together to create a powerful programming and scripting environment. It covers some of the key technical underpinnings for the rest of the book.

Chapter 2, Writing Composable Code, introduces the practice of writing code that can be reused in many places. Composable code is a fundamental concept for the rest of the skills taught in this book.

Chapter 3, Dealing with Errors, teaches you all about exceptions and errors in Maya and Python. We explore several strategies for handling them effectively.

Chapter 4, Leveraging Context Managers and Decorators in Maya, covers context managers and decorators, which are two powerful features of Python, and how they can be used to simplify your code.

Chapter 5, Building Graphical User Interfaces for Maya, demonstrates the PySide and PyQt frameworks, how to abstract your user interface code from underlying logic, and a strategy of building GUIs to maximize maintainability and productivity.

Chapter 6, Automating Maya from the Outside, shows how Maya can be controlled from another process, explains how request-reply systems work, and builds a fully featured automation system on these principles.

Chapter 7, Taming the Maya API, introduces the Maya Python API and how types and classes work in Python and Maya. It contains a number of examples to demonstrate the API, as well as a Maya command plugin.

Chapter 8, Unleashing the Maya API through Python, covers the creation of a library to easily create Maya plugin nodes, demonstrating how to map the Maya API onto Pythonic idioms using metaprogramming.

Chapter 9, Becoming a Part of the Python Community, goes over the concepts behind open source software, demonstrates how to find and use third-party modules, explains how to create your own open source project, and tours the Python and Maya programming communities.

Appendix, Python Best Practices, explains in detail various Python language features and miscellaneous, but very relevant, topics.