Short code to apply matrix transfomation over a cube in maya

matrix_transform_playground.py

import maya.cmds as cmds
import itertools as it

def transpose(m, size=4):
   return list(it.chain.from_iterable(map(
       lambda x: m[x:len(m):size],
       xrange(size)
   )))
 
class TransformationsPlayground(object):
    def __init__(self):
        self.pc = cmds.polyCube()[0]
        
    def getTransformMatrix(self):
        m = transpose(cmds.xform(self.pc, q=True, ws=True, m=True))
        for i in xrange(0, 16, 4):
            print m[i:i+4]
        return m
            
    def setTransformMatrix(self, tMatrix):
       cmds.xform(self.pc, ws=True, m=transpose(tMatrix))
       self.getTransformMatrix()        


#########################################################
############# MAIN EXAMPLES HERE ######################## 
tp = TransformationsPlayground()
tp.getTransformMatrix()

#sccale and translate the cube
m = [
    3.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0,
    0.0, 5.0, 0.0, 2.0,
    0.0, 0.0, 1.0, 0.0,
    0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 1.0   
]

tp.setTransformMatrix(m)
#Rotate the cube 45º over the Y-axis
#calculate matrix in wolframalpha -> {{cos(45),0,sin(45),0},{0,1,0,0},{-sin(45), 0, cos(45),0},{0,0,0,1}}*{{1,0,0,0},{0,1,0,0},{0,0,1,0},{0,0,0,1}}
#1/sqrt(2) = 0.7071
my = [
    0.7071,     0.0, 0.7071, 0.0,
    0.0,        1.0, 0.0,    0.0,
    - 0.7071,   0.0, 0.7071, 0.0,
    0.0,        0.0, 0.0,    1.0   
]
tp.setTransformMatrix(my)