Let’s assume your script needs to change a bunch of system settings. The worst thing that could happen is if your script breaks in the middle of changing things, leaving you with only parts of changes. Provided system restore points are enabled on your machine and your script has admin privileges, PowerShell can easily create…
Continue ReadingSet Up Gmail, Google Calendar, and Google Contacts on iOS
If you’re a heavy user of Google services, it can be a little confusing to set up your Gmail, Google Calendar, and Google Contacts to sync with iOS. You can get all your Google services syncing (complete with push sync—that is, messages push to your phone as soon as you receive them) with iOS by…
Continue ReadingPowerShell: Finding Current Script Path
Here’s a useful function that you can paste into your scripts. It will tell you the current location the script is executed from. function Get-ScriptDirectory{ $Invocation = (Get-Variable MyInvocation -Scope 1).Value try { Split-Path $Invocation.MyCommand.Path -ea 0 } catch { Write-Warning ‘You need to call this function from within a saved script.’ } } Get-ScriptDirectory…
Continue ReadingPowerShell: Copying Command History to Clipboard
Here’s a one-liner that copies all commands from your command history to the clipboard. From there, you could paste them into your favorite PowerShell editor and make your interactive code a script: PS> Get-History | Select-Object -ExpandProperty CommandLine | clip Note that clip.exe is supported on Windows 7 and above only.
Continue ReadingPowerShell: Finding Built-In Administrators Group
Using System User or group names like ‘Administrators’ in scripts may not always be a good idea because they are localized and may not work on machines that use a different UI language. Here is a rather long one-liner that always returns the name of the local Administrators group, regardless of current culture settings: (New-Object…
Continue ReadingPowerShell: Finding Files Owned by a User
Here’s a simple filter that will show only those files and folders that a specific user is owner of: filter Get-Owner ($Account=”$env:UserDomain\$env:USerName”) { if ((Get-ACL $_.Fullname).Owner -like $Account) { $_ } } It is very easy to use. By default, it checks for files and folders owned by you: PS> Dir $home | Get-Owner You…
Continue ReadingPowerShell: Stopping Services Remotely
Stop-Service cannot stop services remotely. One easy way of doing so is Set-Service: Set-Service -Name Spooler -Status “Stopped” -ComputerName targetcomputer However, unlike Stop-Service, Set-Service has no -Force parameter, so you cannot stop services if they, for example, have running dependent services. If your infrastructure supports PowerShell Remoting, you could use Invoke-Command instead: Invoke-Command { Stop-Service…
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