DOWST.DEV

July 31, 2020

Announcements!

PSScriptAnalyzer 1.19.1 (devblogs.microsoft.com)
PSScriptAnalyzer 1.19.1 is now available on the PowerShell Gallery. This minor update fixes a few

user-reported bugs and introduces a new rule (which is disabled by default) for avoiding using double quotes for constant strings. To install this version of the module, open any PowerShell console and run: Install-Module PSScriptAnalyzer -Force -Repository PSGallery

...>more
By: Sydney Smith submitted:Jun 16 2022

Blogs, Articles, and Posts

Automatic Azure AD Conditional Access Documentation (wpninjas.ch)
Creating configuration documentations is always hassle. Therefore, I extended the Intune

documentation with a new option to also document Azure AD Conditional Access policies.

...>more
By: Thomas Kurth submitted:Jun 16 2022

Building PowerShell for Speed (adamtheautomator.com)
In every scripter's journey, a script is never fast enough. To remedy this, let's cover some ways on

how to get the performance of your Powershell scripts to the highest it can be.

...>more
By: Tyler Muir submitted:Jun 16 2022

How IT admins can use PowerShell to monitor CPU usage (searchenterprisedesktop.techtarget.com)
IT administrators that are familiar with PowerShell can use certain scripts to monitor CPU

performance on desktops to determine the root cause of desktop performance issues.

...>more
By: Dan Franciscus submitted:Jun 16 2022

How to Pause a PowerShell Script (adamtheautomator.com)
There are many reasons to pause script execution. Perhaps a script needs to wait for user input,

slow down execution speed, or wait for another process to conclude before moving forward. As with most tasks in Powershell, there is more than one way to pause a script. Depending on what you are trying to accomplish, the method of pausing you choose will have its strengths and weaknesses.

...>more
By: Adam Listek submitted:Jun 16 2022

Open PowerShell files up in VS Code instead of ISE? (twitter.com)
Have you had the desire for that right-click edit command to open PowerShell files up in VS Code

instead of ISE? It is a simple reg update...

...>more
By: Shawn Melton submitted:Jun 16 2022

PowerShell Tips & Tricks (jdhitsolutions.com)
This page is my one-stop-shop for all sorts of PowerShell related, tips, tricks, hacks, suggestions,

and other bits of wisdom I've gleaned over the last 14 years.

...>more
By: Jeff Hicks submitted:Jun 16 2022

Some fun with teams PowerShell module (blog.it-koehler.com)
You may have found my old article from june 1st 2018. Some time has passed since this article was

released. Yes I know there is a overview in Teams Admin Center, but I thought it would be nice to do this and some kind more via PowerShell Module. So I picked up the script and build it again with the organic PowerShell Module for Teams.

...>more
By: Alexander Koehler submitted:Jun 16 2022

What are your useful functions? (reddit.com)
A great thread with a tons of useful functions
By: Reddit submitted:Jun 16 2022

Projects, Scripts, and Modules

RunAsUser (github.com)
This module has been created to have the ability to run scripts under the current user session while

the application executing this script only has SYSTEM access. This is especially useful when performing tasks from RMM(Remote Monitoring and Management) systems that do not have the abilty to execute monitoring components in user-space.

...>more
By: Kelvin Tegelaar submitted:Jun 16 2022

Books, Media, and Learning Resources

#PS7Now (leanpub.com)
Did you miss the #PS7Now #PSBlogweek? Don't worry. All the content on why you should consider moving

to PowerShell 7 has been assembled into a free single ebook. Brought to you by your favorite PowerShell community members. The book is offered for free, although we hope you'll consider making a donation for the OnRamp Scholarship fund.

...>more
By: Jeff Hicks submitted:Jun 16 2022

PowerShell Training at SANS (blueteampowershell.com)
Jason Fossen's six-day PowerShell for the Blue Team course is currently hosted by the SANS Institute

as course SEC505: Securing Windows and PowerShell Automation.

...>more
By: Jason Fossen submitted:Jun 16 2022

Serverless Event-based Automation with PowerShell & Azure Functions (youtube.com)
Automate and manage your cloud-native, hybrid, and even on-premises resources using PowerShell.

Eamon O'Reilly, who's leading the efforts at Microsoft for serverless automation, shows you how to get started.

...>more
By: Microsoft Mechanics submitted:Jun 16 2022

Fun

Conway’s Game of Life (reddit.com)
Made Conway's Game of Life in good ol' Powershell!
By: u/blithen submitted:Jun 16 2022

How to tune your Guitar with Powershell (scriptinglibrary.com)
I wanted to celebrate my 100th article doing something simple and out of the ordinary. Looking back

one popular article using PowerShell written 2 years ago was Text-To-Speach in 3 lines of code, so I've decided to play with sounds.

...>more
By: Paolo Frigo submitted:Jun 16 2022

Retro Synthwave Theme for PowerShell in Windows Terminal (reddit.com)
I made a synthwave-y type theme for PowerShell for Windows Terminal. You can either use the theme OR

I commented out the color names to align with PowerShell tokens so you can use it as a base to create your own theme.

...>more
By: u/thebeersgoodnbelgium submitted:Jun 16 2022

Do you have a suggestion for PowerShell Weekly? Do you know something that should be included? Let me know in the comments below, or on
twitter.

July 24, 2020

Announcements!

Windows Package Manager Preview (v0.1.41821) (devblogs.microsoft.com)
The first update to the Windows Package Manager has been released. If you are a Windows Insider or

part of our Package Manager Insider program, you should already have the latest version. Launch the store and check for updates if you're an insider and you don't have it. If you prefer to just download the client, head on over to GitHub releases page and take it for a spin. You can also join the Windows Package Manager Insider Program if you'd like automatic updates from the store, and you want to run on the released version of Windows 10.

...>more
By: Demitrius Nelon submitted:Jun 16 2022

Windows Terminal Preview 1.2 Release (devblogs.microsoft.com)
Windows Terminal Preview has new features for version 1.2 which will appear in Windows Terminal in

August. You can download Windows Terminal Preview and Windows Terminal from the Microsoft Store or from the GitHub releases page. Let's dive into what's new!

...>more
By: Kayla Cinnamon submitted:Jun 16 2022

Blogs, Articles, and Posts

Building PowerShell for Speed (adamtheautomator.com)
In every scripter's journey, a script is never fast enough. To remedy this, let's cover some ways on

how to get the performance of your PowerShell scripts to the highest it can be.

...>more
By: Tyler Muir submitted:Jun 16 2022

Monitoring with PowerShell: Notifying users of Windows Updates (cyberdrain.com)
With my recently released RunAsUser module there's been an influx of questions on what it could be

used for. I've tried to describe as much as possible on the github page and the previous blog about it. But one I wanted to talk about real quick is the ability to create Toast notifications.

...>more
By: Kelvin Tegelaar submitted:Jun 16 2022

Using PowerShell to rename, move or reconnect an Azure VM (dev.to)
Sometimes you need to change something on a VM. You may want to rename it for compliance reasons,

change the network, change the disk name, etc

...>more
By: Olivier Miossec submitted:Jun 16 2022

Projects, Scripts, and Modules

Green Means Go – A Mutex Demo (github.com)
I posted a write up on using a Mutex in PowerShell to synchronize access to a resource (comes in

handy when using Jobs and Threads) Enjoy!

...>more
By: Ryan Leap submitted:Jun 16 2022

PSScriptAnalyzer (github.com)
PSScriptAnalyzer is a static code checker for PowerShell modules and scripts. PSScriptAnalyzer

checks the quality of PowerShell code by running a set of rules. The rules are based on PowerShell best practices identified by PowerShell Team and the community. It generates DiagnosticResults (errors and warnings) to inform users about potential code defects and suggests possible solutions for improvements.

...>more
By: PowerShell Team submitted:Jun 16 2022

Updating PowerShell About Help (jdhitsolutions.com)
During some recent work, I realized my new Windows PowerShell 5.1 installs are missing the About

help topics. Apparently, this is a known issue, although I don't think it gets a lot of attention. Microsoft is working on improving updateable help for PowerShell 7 which I think will also have a beneficial change for Windows PowerShell. Microsoft has in fact been updating the about topics. All of the help files are open source on GitHub at https://github.com/MicrosoftDocs/PowerShell-Docs/tree/staging/reference. I use the about topics often, so I wrote a PowerShell script to download and install the latest About topics from GitHub.

...>more
By: Jeff Hicks submitted:Jun 16 2022

Books, Media, and Learning Resources

Learning Powershell: Weaning Yourself Away From the GUI for Active Directory (networkadm.in)
I recently was a guest on the Hybrid Identity Podcast to discuss getting started with automation and

how it fits in with Identity Management. This is a new podcast presented by Semperis and hosted by 15 time MVP Sean Deuby. The podcast is off to a fantastic start with wide range of experts in the field of Identity Management. It's a great listen because of the topics but also because the episodes are only 15-20 minutes in length.

...>more
By: Mike Kanakos submitted:Jun 16 2022

Module Monday: PSWritePDF (youtube.com)
This Monday, we are looking at PSWritePDF. PSWritePDF is a module for manipulating PDF files. You

can create new PDFs, merge PDFs, split PDFs and extract text from PDFs.

...>more
By: Adam Driscoll submitted:Jun 16 2022

Fun

Fun With PowerShell (reddit.com)
Mario Themes
By: u/geostude submitted:Jun 16 2022

Having Some Fun (reddit.com)
Because why not 🙂
By: u/INATHANB submitted:Jun 16 2022

Upcoming Events

Chicago PowerShell Conference (chicagopowershell.com)
Free virtual PowerShell Conference with keynote speaker Jeffery Snover
By: Chicago PowerShell submitted:Jun 16 2022

Do you have a suggestion for PowerShell Weekly? Do you know something that should be included? Let me know in the comments below, or on
twitter.

July 17, 2020

Announcements!

Azure PowerShell 4.4.0 Released (powershellgallery.com)
We have added cmdlets to manage Azure Network Virtual Appliance and several updates for Azure

Storage!

...>more
By: Microsoft submitted:Jun 16 2022

v7.0.3 Release of PowerShell (github.com)
Available for download and install now!
By: PowerShell Team submitted:Jun 16 2022

Version 2002 release notes – Configuration Manager (docs.microsoft.com)
Configuration Manager current branch version 1910 is the baseline for these changes.
By: Microsoft submitted:Jun 16 2022

Blogs, Articles, and Posts

Detecting Wired, Wireless, and VPN Connections using PowerShell (deploymentresearch.com)
In a recent customer project we needed to detect whether the clients where connected via Wired,

Wireless (WiFi) and/or VPN. This was a decent sized environment, about 50K clients, with hardware models from both HP, Dell, and Lenovo. The existing code I had did not work across all the hardware, so I reached out to the ConfigMgr community, and got some great tips...

...>more
By: Johan Arwidmark submitted:Jun 16 2022

Generating Advanced hunting queries with PowerShell (verboon.info)
I was recently writing some advanced hunting queries for Microsoft Defender ATP to search for the

execution of specific PowerShell commands. If you are just looking for one specific command, you can run query as shown below. But if you are looking for several functions, then there is going to be a lot of manual editing, and so the idea was born to use PowerShell to help me generate an advanced hunting query.

...>more
By: Alex Verboon submitted:Jun 16 2022

How to Delete Microsoft Teams Cache for All Users via PowerShell (techcommunity.microsoft.com)
Sometimes there is a need to delete Microsoft Teams cache to quicken the adoption of an in-band

policy change or simply troubleshoot an issue. The challenge here is that the cache for Microsoft Teams is in multiple directories. This can be done manually but would result in a slow and tedious process. Again, we turn to PowerShell to automate this process and this time it's a one-liner that addresses this opportunity.

...>more
By: Anthony Bartolo submitted:Jun 16 2022

Want to Write Beautiful PowerShell Code? Here’s How. (adamtheautomator.com)
Elegant, beautiful code that's crystal clear to read, easily-manageable and simple to add

functionality to. It's every PowerShell developer's dream. And it's possible.

...>more
By: Adam Bertram submitted:Jun 16 2022

Projects, Scripts, and Modules

Automatically set desktop wallpaper to the current spotlight image : PowerShell (reddit.com)
I've been enjoying the images of Spotlight and wanted to have it set as my desktop wallpaper.

Unfortunately this feature isn't built into Windows 10. So... Powershell to the rescue!

...>more
By: u/Otacrow submitted:Jun 16 2022

Get-PCUptime (networkadm.in)
Find out how long computers have been running via PowerShell
By: Mike Kanakos submitted:Jun 16 2022

PSDates (powershellgallery.com)
Shameless self promotion time. PSDates provides a set of tools to help you better work with dates

and times in PowerShell. It contains function to help you find specific date formats, get certain dates based on other dates (first/last day of the month or year, patch Tuesday, etc). I also has functions for working with timezones, unix time, WMI time, crontabs.

...>more
By: Matthew Dowst submitted:Jun 16 2022

Books, Media, and Learning Resources

How to Write Scripts that Combine Azure CLI with PowerShell (cloudskills.io)
Most articles that are written, regardless of who writes them, either focus on PowerShell or Azure

CLI. Two of the most popular ways to automate Azure workloads are always presented separately. Why? Azure CLI and PowerShell work well together right out of the box for all Azure services. How can we bring the two automation tools together?

...>more
By: Michael Levan submitted:Jun 16 2022

Module Monday: PSDepend – YouTube (youtube.com)
Module Monday is a video series where I look at a cool PowerShell module every Monday. This Monday,

I looked at PSDepend. PSDepend is a simple dependency handler built on PowerShell. I show how to install various dependencies, how to order dependencies and how to build different types of requirements files.

...>more
By: Adam Driscoll submitted:Jun 16 2022

Fun

Are you already an advanced PowerShell user? (forms.microsoft.com)
Take the quiz and find out
By: Patrick Gruenauer submitted:Jun 16 2022

Justin Grote on Twitter: “Did you know? (twitter.com)
Powershell fully supports unicode, meaning you can do fun stuff like this...
By: Justin Grote submitted:Jun 16 2022

We’ve all been there (twitter.com)
Demonstrating the use of GIFs on PowerShell toast notifications.
By: Josh King submitted:Jun 16 2022

Do you have a suggestion for PowerShell Weekly? Do you know something that should be included? Let me know in the comments below, or on
twitter.

July 10, 2020

Announcements!

Find-Cmdlet (find-cmdlet.com)
A search engine for PowerShell cmdlets
By: u/mrmonday submitted:Jun 16 2022

Release v7.1.0-preview.5 Release of PowerShell (github.com)
Note: The MSIX is currently blocked by other factors external to the PS team. We're waiting on a

solution before we can ship another MSIX. In the meantime, please use the MSI packages.

...>more
By: PowerShell Team submitted:Jun 16 2022

Blogs, Articles, and Posts

Active Directory Help Desk – Computer Report (ironmansoftware.com)
In this blog post, we will look at how to create a scheduled script to collect some information

about computers in our Active Directory domain. Then, we will update our dashboard and take advantage of the charting capabilities of Universal Dashboard to show the information in an easy to digest manner.

...>more
By: Adam Driscoll submitted:Jun 16 2022

Did you know the PowerShell split method has a ‘MaxSubString’ parameter? (twitter.com)
If you specify .split('.',2) it'll split the string at the first two and then stop.
By: Jess Pomfret submitted:Jun 16 2022

Generate a DHCP Report Via PowerShell (spiderzebra.com)
Today we are going to look at how to generate a DHCP scope statistics HTML report by using

PowerShell. This report will give you one location to see all of your DHCP scope statistics across all of your Windows DHCP servers. It will dynamically pull the DHCP servers and associated DHCP scopes within your Active Directory domain. This report will help you keep an eye on the usage of all of your DHCP scopes so you can prevent scopes from filling up. With this PowerShell script there is no need to import a list of DHCP servers or hard code them in a variable. I recommend setting this up as a recurring scheduled task so that the report runs without the need for manual intervention.

...>more
By: SpiderZebra submitted:Jun 16 2022

How to Manage Hyper-V VM Checkpoints with PowerShell (thomasmaurer.ch)
In this blog post we are going to have a look at how you can create, manage, apply, and remove VM

Checkpoints in Hyper-V using PowerShell. Hyper-V virtual machine (VM) checkpoints are one of the great benefits of virtualization. Before Windows Server 2012 R2, they were known as virtual machine snapshots. VM Checkpoints in Hyper-V allow you to save the system state of a VM to a specific time and then revert back to that state if you need to. This is great if you are testing software and configuration changes, or if you have a demo environment, which you want to reset.

...>more
By: Thomas Maurer submitted:Jun 16 2022

How to Python in PowerShell (cloudskills.io)
We see a ton of articles and posts about getting started in PowerShell to Python, but how about from

Python to PowerShell? In this blog post, you will get a hands-on approach at Python-ing in PowerShell. We will go over basics of how to run commands and scripts then get into logic and loops.

...>more
By: Michael Levan submitted:Jun 16 2022

Windows Terminal: The Ultimate Guide (adamtheautomator.com)
In this Ultimate Guide, you're going to learn about one of the best consoles around for developers;

the Windows Terminal. You're going to get a full rundown of nearly all features of Windows Terminal and learn how it can help you get things on Windows at the command line.

...>more
By: Chris Blackden submitted:Jun 16 2022

Books, Media, and Learning Resources

Discovering Chocolatey with Stephen Valdinger (youtube.com)
Discovering Chocolatey, with Stephen Valdinger, software management on Windows' secret weapon. We'll

discuss what chocolatey is, software management automation, and dive into working with choco. Stop deploying software the hard way!

...>more
By: Denver PowerShell User Group submitted:Jun 16 2022

Making Your First Module (youtube.com)
Mike Kanakos walks the SoCal PowerShell User Group through the PowerShell module authoring process

step by step to get you started on writing your own modules.

...>more
By: Mike Kanakos submitted:Jun 16 2022

PowerShell Tutorial – CH10 – HashTables (youtube.com)
Access a hash table value by key. Creating a Hash Table. Add a key value pair to hash table. Remove

a key value pair from hash table. Enumerating through keys and Key-Value Pairs

...>more
By: TeachJing submitted:Jun 16 2022

Fun

How to Add Voice to Your PowerShell Scripts (adamtheautomator.com)
One of PowerShell's core design principles is to allow the end-user to jump right in with little to

no shell experience and hit the ground running. However, PowerShell can let you get creative too. For example, did you know you can call upon the .NET classes library in Windows to enhance your PowerShell experience? One of those ways is to use .NET to teach PowerShell how to speak to you!

...>more
By: Francisco Navarro submitted:Jun 16 2022

My new PowerShell stickers arrived already! (twitter.com)
I'm covering the costs for these so can't send them out individually. If you run a #PowerShell user

group, reply here and we can work out how I can send some.

...>more
By: Steve Lee submitted:Jun 16 2022

PowerShell/Chibi_Avatar.png (github.com)
New chibi version of the avatar
By: Steve Lee submitted:Jun 16 2022

Do you have a suggestion for PowerShell Weekly? Do you know something that should be included? Let me know in the comments below, or on
twitter.

July 3, 2020

Blogs, Articles, and Posts

Modern Auth and Unattended Scripts in Exchange Online PowerShell V2 (techcommunity.microsoft.com)
Today, we are happy to announce the Public Preview of a Modern Auth unattended scripting option for

use with Exchange Online PowerShell V2. This feature provides customers the ability to run non-interactive scripts using Modern Authentication. This feature requires version 2.0.3-Preview or later of the EXO PowerShell V2 module, available via PowerShellGallery.

...>more
By: The Exchange Team submitted:Jun 16 2022

PowerShell to C# and Back – Introduction to Classes (ridicurious.com)
The purpose of this blog post is to bridge the learning and concept gap between PowerShell and C#

classses, to jump start you from scripting to development. This is not deep diving in C# concepts, we will cover this in later sessions of this series.

...>more
By: Prateek Singh submitted:Jun 16 2022

Serial vs Parallel Processing (scriptinglibrary.com)
Whenever I look for improving the performances of a script or code there is sometimes an option for

parallelising the processing/execution of some of the workflows. It generally means adding complexity and is not always the case that it will make necessary the whole process so much faster, but for long-running ones made of independent sub-tasks, it is probably a very effective strategy.

...>more
By: Paolo Frigo submitted:Jun 16 2022

Setup FTP Server with PowerShell (ridicurious.com)
In this article, we are going to discuss step by step installation and configuration of the FTP

server using PowerShell and IIS from installing the required Windows features, setting up sites, ports, and root folder to creating FTP users and authenticating them on FTP site to allow access to the FTP servers.

...>more
By: Madhav Bhandari submitted:Jun 16 2022

Projects, Scripts, and Modules

Microsoft Power BI Cmdlets (github.com)
A great overview of the Power BI cmdlets and how to use them.
By: Alex Powers submitted:Jun 16 2022

POSHGUI (poshgui.com)
The Alpha version of a completely new, WPF designer is now available
By: Maciej Obuchowski submitted:Jun 16 2022

Books, Media, and Learning Resources

Querying the Graph API with Powershell and Jupyter Notebooks (youtube.com)
Welcome everyone and this video I will go over querying the graph API with powershell and jupyter

notebooks. feel free to clone the repo or spin up the site on mybinders yourself.

...>more
By: TeachJing submitted:Jun 16 2022

Do you have a suggestion for PowerShell Weekly? Do you know something that should be included? Let me know in the comments below, or on
twitter.

PowerShell Weekly – Your weekly round up of all things PowerShell

Categories

Archive