My commentary for Beginner Event 5 in the 2011 Scripting Games is now available. One item that seems to be missing on the ScriptingGuys site is my complete solution so I thought I would share it here, plus a variation.
Category: Scripting
Get Common Data
While judging entries in this year’s Scripting Games I realized there were some common properties that were repeatedly used. This got me thinking about a simple way to retrieve that information with a single command Then you could access the data values from within your script. I’ve put together a relatively simply function called Get-Common…
What Made the Scripting Games Easier
I can easily say that the quantity and caliber of script submissions in this year’s Scripting Games has been amazing. I congratulate all of you on your hard work and trust it will pay off. I’d say a primary goal is education. Not only will you pick up tips from the judges but also from…
Convert Aliases with the Tokenizer
Last week I posted a function you can use in the Windows PowerShell ISE to convert aliases to command definitions. My script relied on regular expressions to seek out and replace aliases. A number of people asked me why I didn’t use the PowerShell tokenizer. My answer was that because I’m not a developer and…
Scripting Games 2011 Notes from the Field
I’ve been making headway in reviewing and judging entries in the 2011 Scripting Games. I know there has been a lot of discussion about the lack of comments and I’m doing what I can with entries I judge, but I’m not guaranteeing anything. What I will do is put down some overall comments and impressions…
Friday Fun PowerShell Pep Talk
Today’s Friday Fun is meant to help get you excited about the upcoming Scripting Games. I want to add a little pep to your PowerShell prompt. Perhaps it will even keep you motivated. What I have for you today are variety of prompt functions. Consider them variations on a theme.
Get File Hash
The other day I had the need to calculate MD5 file hashes in order to compare files. The PowerShell Community Extensions has a nifty cmdlet, Get-Hash, that does exactly that. Unfortunately, sometimes even free tools like this aren’t an option, as in the case of my client. Or they don’t go far enough. So with…
New Comment Help
If you follow my blog I’m sure you noticed that I post a lot of advanced functions and scripts. While I don’t expect every one to be developing advanced functions, the closer you can get the more powerful your work. With the Scripting Games approaching I thought I’d offer up a little something to help…
Friday Fun Create Numbered File
I was working on my guest commentary for the upcoming Scripting Games and started thinking I would need a line numbered version of my solution to help explain. Turns out I didn’t go down that road, but in the process I put together a little PowerShell to take a text file and create a line…
Friday Fun Virtual Demos
I’ve been prepping my demo scripts for Techmentor using the ubiquitous Start-Demo, and realized I could take things further. I mean, why do I have to do all the talking? Windows 7 has a terrific text to speech engine so why not take advantage of it. With a little work I could create a virtual…
Get IP Data
I was doodling in PowerShell this morning and ended up with what I hope is a useful function to retrieve IP configuration information, sort of like IPCONFIG, but using WMI. The beauty is that I can connect to remote machines and the output is an object which leads to all sorts of possibilities. My function…
Get Variable Definition
Last week a question came across my email about how to find out where a variable came from. I thought this was a great question because I’ve run into this scenario as well. I see a variable but don’t recall what command I typed to create it. What I need is an easy way to…
Friday Fun Get MessageBox
Today’s Friday Fun offers a way for you to graphically interact with your PowerShell scripts and functions without resorting to a lot of complex Winform scripting. I have a function that you can use to display an interactive message box complete with buttons like Yes, No or Cancel. You can either use the message box…
PowerShell Automatic Logging
If you regularly download or look at the functions and scripts I post here, you’ll notice I often use Write-Verbose to indicate what is happening. This comes in handy for troubleshooting. But often it would also be helpful to record as a log file of script activity. Unfortunately, you can’t pipe Write-Verbose to Out-File. So…
Get My Variables
As you might imagine I write a lot of PowerShell scripts and examples. Often my PowerShell Window is open for days at a time. One challenge I have always has is trying to remember what variables I have defined. If I knew the name I’d simply use Get-Variable. What I really want is a way…