Difference between revisions of "Scripting Tutorial: My Second Script"
Scripting Tutorial: My Second Script (edit)
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{{Featured}} | |||
While the [[My First Script]] tutorial is a good first taste of scripting for Oblivion, it does not appreciably demonstrate what the scripting language in Oblivion can do. It is a wonderful introduction for those who have never seen a programming or scripting language before, but a more in-depth tutorial would be helpful to further introduce modders to this amazing resource. | While the [[My First Script]] tutorial is a good first taste of scripting for Oblivion, it does not appreciably demonstrate what the scripting language in Oblivion can do. It is a wonderful introduction for those who have never seen a programming or scripting language before, but a more in-depth tutorial would be helpful to further introduce modders to this amazing resource. | ||
This tutorial has been largely adapted from GhanBuriGhan's excellent ''Morrowind Scripting for Dummies''; all credit goes to | This tutorial has been largely adapted from GhanBuriGhan's excellent ''Morrowind Scripting for Dummies''; all credit goes to GhanBuriGhan for his fantastic work on the original. | ||
This tutorial is meant to be a more complete introduction to scripting for Oblivion than the My First Script tutorial, and assumes that the reader is already familiar with My First Script. If you do not understand the main points of that tutorial, you may find yourself in over your head here. If you're comfortable with My First Script, though, let's begin scripting! | This tutorial is meant to be a more complete introduction to scripting for Oblivion than the My First Script tutorial, and assumes that the reader is already familiar with My First Script. If you do not understand the main points of that tutorial, you may find yourself in over your head here. If you're comfortable with My First Script, though, let's begin scripting! | ||
{{Tools|req0=[[The Elder Scrolls Construction Set|Construction Set]]|opt0=[[OBSE]]}} | |||
==More information about scripting in Oblivion== | ==More information about scripting in Oblivion== | ||
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You enter the script editor either by selecting Gameplay –> Edit Scripts from the menu; by clicking the edit script button (the pencil) at the far right of the taskbar; or by accessing it from an Object or NPC dialogue, clicking the button with the ellipses […] next to the script field. The editor window is pretty basic, and doesn't look like much right now: | You enter the script editor either by selecting Gameplay –> Edit Scripts from the menu; by clicking the edit script button (the pencil) at the far right of the taskbar; or by accessing it from an Object or NPC dialogue, clicking the button with the ellipses […] next to the script field. The editor window is pretty basic, and doesn't look like much right now: | ||
[[Image:1_script_window.JPG|thumb| | [[Image:1_script_window.JPG|thumb|right|The scripting window]]Let's have a look at the buttons in the taskbar, from left to right: | ||
<ul><li>''Open'' lets you select a script to edit.</li> | |||
<li>''Save'' error checks the current script and either compiles it or gives out error messages. Note, however, that the plugin and thus the script is not really saved to disk at this time. When programming large scripts you should frequently use the save command in the main TESCS window after you have saved the script here, just in case the TESCS crashes. Note also that if you edit the script and suddenly hit "save plugin" to backup in the middle of the work, your updated script will NOT be saved with it. You must save it manually first. Also, if you simply close the script window, it doesn’t mean that script will be saved. You must take care of it yourself. | |||
<blockquote>Side Note: You can also write your code in external editors and paste it into the CS. This can make it easier to keep scripts saved, and can be more convenient, since you don't have to load the CS and your mod. Options include [[S!lk]], emacs, and [[Notepad++ Script Definitions|Notepad++]], all of which have syntax highlighting plugins for Oblivion script (only Notepad++ has up-to-date OBSE functions included, however).</blockquote></li> | |||
<li>''Forward'' and ''Backward'' arrows jump to the next or previous script, respectively (in alphabetical order). If you give your scripts a common tag, that will make it easier to jump between the different scripts of your project. For example, say a modder's pseudonym is Grundulum, and he starts every script name with "GR_ShortReferencetoProject_", with that second part being a two or three letter reference to the current mod; this keeps all of the scripts you're working on neatly together.</li> | |||
''Forward'' and ''Backward'' arrows jump to the next or previous script, respectively (in alphabetical order). If you give your scripts a common tag, that will make it easier to jump between the different scripts of your project. For example, | <li>''Compile all'' recompiles all scripts in all loaded files. '''Do not ever press this button.''' It also adds every script in Oblivion to your mod, so you'll wind up with a 2MB esp file that conflicts with '''''everything'''''.</li> | ||
<li>Finally, the ''Delete'' button deletes a script, and</li> | |||
<li>the last ''Arrow down'' button closes the script window.</li></ul> | |||
At the far right of your toolbar, you'll see a dropdown box called ''Script Type''. This box allows you to choose one of three kinds that your script will fall under: Object, Quest, and Magic Effect. More on these later, but by way of brief introduction Object scripts are attached to objects in the game world (such as items or NPCs), Quest scripts control the flow of quests (such as character generation), and Magic Effect scripts control a very special magic effect (specifically, the Script Effect). | At the far right of your toolbar, you'll see a dropdown box called ''Script Type''. This box allows you to choose one of three kinds that your script will fall under: Object, Quest, and Magic Effect. More on these later, but by way of brief introduction Object scripts are attached to objects in the game world (such as items or NPCs), Quest scripts control the flow of quests (such as character generation), and Magic Effect scripts control a very special magic effect (specifically, the Script Effect). | ||
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; Here we will enter what happens when the chest is opened. | ; Here we will enter what happens when the chest is opened. | ||
End</pre> | End</pre> | ||
'''Click ''Save'' again now.''' The script still doesn't do anything, but at least now we have defined under what conditions it will run. There are a couple of things to note here. First, we have ended the current block before beginning a new one—not so important when there's only one block, but as this script gets more complicated we'll need multiple blocks in a single script. In somewhat more technical terms, '''Begin/End blocks do not nest.''' The other thing to notice is the semicolon ";" on line 4. A semicolon marks the rest of the line as ''comment''. Whatever you type after the semicolon | '''Click ''Save'' again now.''' The script still doesn't do anything, but at least now we have defined under what conditions it will run. There are a couple of things to note here. First, we have ended the current block before beginning a new one—not so important when there's only one block, but as this script gets more complicated we'll need multiple blocks in a single script. In somewhat more technical terms, '''Begin/End blocks do not nest.''' The other thing to notice is the semicolon ";" on line 4. A semicolon marks the rest of the line as ''comment''. | ||
===Code Comments=== | |||
Comments can be placed anywhere in-code with the semicolon character - ''';''' - Whatever you type ''after'' the semicolon on the same line will be ignored when the script compiles. If you want more than one line of comment, you must have one semicolon for each line. | |||
You use comments inside your scripts to generally explain what you are trying to accomplish in your code, which can help you and others understand what's going on inside the script quickly at a later date. Comments can also serve as a debugging technique by commenting out lines of code one-by-one to pinpoint the source of some odd or unintended effect in-game. | |||
Note: Because everything appearing on a line after the semicolon is not treated as compilable code, one issue you might face is that you cannot simply put semicolons in strings. If you need to have a semicolon as part of a string - for example a message in-game - you could instead use the [[OBSE]] "%a" Format Specifier for functions that support this and passing in ASCII character code 59, or use the [[AsciiToChar]] OBSE function. | |||
===Writing text and obtaining decisions from the player=== | ===Writing text and obtaining decisions from the player=== | ||