Space Engineers Tutorial: Intro to Scripts with Automatic LCDs by MMaster (survival tutorials, tips)

In this video I go through an introduction to scripts and programmable blocks in Space Engineers using MMaster's Automatic LCDs 2 as the example script.

You can find his script here:

He also asked that I point people to his written guide as he keeps it up to date with any changes, you can find it here:

If you're a more visual learner you can have a look at his video guide which covers some of the script in more detail than I did here:

If you've got any of your own tips for making sure that scripts function as they are supposed to please let me know.

As always, don't forget to enjoy this awesome (if at times buggy) game!

Music and Sound Effects by:
Space Engineers

[Drakefance]

Never really messed with scripting, i know there are alot of great things capable engineers can do, so this helps alot as a basic intro, thanks

[tassie]

This scrip is by far the best addition I find to the game.

One problem that does occur, that wasn't shown in this clip, is that when writing a long argument (like getting a list of specific Ingots with a quantity set for each), you will quickly lose sight of the information you are entering in the Custom Data because the text doesn't wrap.

There are two ways around this:

1st, you can look to see when you are getting close to the width of the Data box, then hit Enter to go to the next line and keep repeating the process until all of your data has been entered. HOWEVER, once you have done this, you must remember to backspace each point at which you Entered or the data will not be interpreted correctly.

The 2nd way to overcome the problem is to type out your Data in a word document, then copy and paste it into the Custom Data. This for me is by far the best way to do it as your word document will automatically wrap the text, ensuring that all of the necessary spacing stays as it should and you can easily see what it is that you are writing. Additionally, you can then save your Data to copy and paste into new LCDs as and when required. It also makes it extremely easy to amend Data when required.

For example this is the data entry for my first list of Components that fills 1 x Double LCD Panel:

Inventory {SCC} +bulletproofglass:200 +construction:2000 +computer:1000 +detector:200 +display:500 +girder:500 +interiorplate:2000 +largetube:2000

I now use this way of keeping all of my Automatic LCD Data entries. This way they are quick to set up and I don't have to worry as much about forgetting the correct layout to give me the information that I want. Plus, they are much easier to amend this way.

[DStInIeus]

This script showcase is spot on. Automatic LCD's 2 is one of the most useful scripts. Thanks for finally getting into scripts, Important subject.

[morphman]

Speed and distance may be important to update frequently, but if the display is just informational, to let you know how much you got when you look at it once in a while, you don't really need to update it that often. You can save yourself a lot of performance by updating it maybe once every 5 seconds, or even once every 10 seconds if you're around the display a lot. If you're not around the display a lot, you could even get away with updating it once a minute. Though at that point, it should probably not be an automatic update anyway, then it's more of an on-demand update, so I would suggest you put low-priority informational displays to be updated via button press instead.

"How much power do I have" might be good to know at a glance from a distance, but "Has my iron ore gone from 1 million to half a million since I last checked" might be something you can take the extra time to go press a button to find out. That is still faster and more convenient than going into the inventory, searching and then adding up all inventories of iron ore manually, but it does not cause updates on the system.

One or two scripts may not cause much problem at all, but imagine having 10 screens, leaving the base for a while, making 2-3 autominers, a few drones, maybe a car or 2. All of a sudden you're making 50-60 calls per second to the script engine, dragging down that physics calculation just enough to tempt Klang into sinking that autominer's drill a TINY bit too far into the asteroid surface and BOOM. All of that could've been sorted with either a button, or by updating less often.

[numberguy]

Splitsie you're such a great teacher than any other player I've ever listened to! You take the time to explain every detail even what common buttons you use on your keyboard. You've opened my eyes to how scripting language works and have won my subscription to you. Jolly well done good sir and thanks!

[MattsPlayCorner]

Nice! Thanks for making this tutorial. Always happy to see people help other people to get stuff working <3 (MMaster)

[ChozoSR]

And to think, I was _just_ looking for such a video; I used to use Automatic LCDs and I just started using it again, and aside from power, powertime, speed, and stopdistance, I can't for the life of me remember how to use thing. Barring the [LCD] tag, of course lol

[joshuahansen]

Definitely a helpful tutorial. I recently started using the Solar Alignment script on a gravetoid base inspired by the one you built in your Survival...Impossible series. It's been a great script to have, and I can definitely say that this one will be next on my list of scripts to add.

[ComradeDragon]

Scripts were always too complicated for me to understand but after watching this, I may give it a go.

[BillysFingers]

I never thought i was going to get this to work until i found this video, thanks!!

[AndyE]

Nice going man, I watched your video on LCD's a while ago where you said you didn't quite know how to do scripts. Glad to see you learning new skills in the game to help out your audience

[leandroatreides]

I got this script a couple of days ago after watching the 30min MMaster's video on it showing the basic commands. I've always been afraid to use scripts in games but, man, does this one is quite useful and hands-down. Now I have LCDs monitoring my resources, batteries, charging time, and whatnot!!!! There's also a command to display damaged parts (you set the percentage like show stuff with damage below 90%, and you can also include incomplete construction blocks. It's very useful to check the LCD panel for any damage on the ship or rover I've jus docked on my main base.) Isy's scripts are also great, especially the docking-recharging one that sets your batteries to recharge when connected to a connector and reverse them back to "Auto" when disconnecting. So no more ships crashing to the ground because I forgot to change the batteries to "auto" again before undocking, lol.

[riphaven]

they've changed a few things with the timer block set up, but your right on the money with everything, thank you, Keen should be paying you to do these videos.

[Dydreth]

This demystifies the basics of using scripts. Thanks for this!

[ImaITman]

So I just started playing after release. I was getting ready to start programming these screens and then I saw this video....thank God I don't have a huge amount of time on my hand so this is glorious to simplify it down to pretty much command prompt style "coding"

[hallofo]

Thank you for your take on this subject, as a novice to scripting myself it's good to see what can be done with only a little bit of hands-on!

[Jackson-ubuv]

0:00 Sounds similar to Ra's theme.

[Brikzay]

What about rigging a camera as an input and the LCD as the output? Too OP or not possible?

[macgabhann]

finally decided to give this a try never worked with scripts or programming blocks till today even though I subed to a ton of scripts now im wishing I would have done this a long time ago.

[usurpinesusanti]

Just scripts are not available on most servers where i play in survival mode. Is there a way to make good scripts like the automatic LCD available without people messing up servers with bugged scripts ?