call multi-sub materials

You're right - the code I

You're right - the code I wrote would in effect only toggle a standard map *within* a multi-sub material... Here's a possible fix (take note that now my IF statement is getting complicated with an if/else) there are a lot better ways to do this but oh well, this works too...

-- function to toggle the showtexturemap function. accepts a map parameter and a on/off parameter
fn toggleShowTextureMap m mapstate = try (showTextureMap m m.diffuseMap mapstate) catch()
 
--get selection of objects as array
objs = selection as array
 
for o in objs where o.material != undefined do-- loop through object array only when objects have a material
	if classof o.material == Multimaterial then -- check if material assigned is multimaterial
		for m in o.material do --loop through sub materials
			if classof m == Standard do 	--check if a material is a standard material
				toggleShowTextureMap m on --toggle the map using our function above
	else if classof o.material == Standard do -- else check if mat is standard mat
		toggleShowTextureMap o.material on --toggle the map using our function above

Actually you'll find the

Actually you'll find the code I posted already checks for standard materials - it just does it in a different spot from the multi-material check.

Here's some pseudocode (programmer lingo for summarized english translation of code)

- create a list of selected objects in memory
- loop through those selected objects, check if there is a material applied
- check if material is a multi-material
-loop through the multi-mat sub materials
- check if submat is a standard material
- toggle the texture map display of submaterial diffusemap

...

As far as how to learn - the MAXScript help is a great place to start - so is ripping apart existing, working scripts. Seeing how other people do things is one of the most useful ways to learn (IMHO).

There are also several huge MAXScript forums
- CGTalk MAXScript & SDK - http://forums.cgsociety.org/forumdisplay.php?f=98
- The Area MAXScript - http://area.autodesk.com/index.php/forums/viewforum/59/

And of course there's ScriptSpot and I'm glad you found your way over here. :-) While there are some other script repositories, this is the biggest (and oldest). That means its also a great way to learn because there are so many different tools you can just rip apart and figure out what they're doing.

Here are some links to training resources:
- Free Video Tutorials - http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/tutorials/free-video-tutorials
- Commercial training options - http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/tutorials/commercial-training-options

This isn't exactly what you

This isn't exactly what you want to know but I depend on Neil Blevins' script pack in my daily workflow and he's got a ton of function pre-written as part of his file slib.ms ... So once you install his scripts, you'll have all kinds of functions available that you can call.

Link to download Neil's scripts - http://www.neilblevins.com/soulburnscripts/soulburnscripts.htm

In this case, he has a function called sLibGetAllMaterialsOnSelectedObjects which gets all the materials on the selected objects... If your object has a multi-mat with 10 sub mats his function will return 11 materials (the root mat and the 10 subs).

The code would go something like this:

selmats = sLibGetAllMaterialsOnSelectedObjects()
for m in selmats do try(showTextureMap m m.diffuseMap on) catch()

The try/catch statement is lazy mans way of avoiding errors. The proper way to code it would be to check the material class with classof but in this case I don't have any idea what kinds of materials you use in your workflow so its just easier for me to write it this way for you...