Ok first of all as you may have noticed, I haven’t posted for a while! Appologies! I will get my finger out of the next week or so and make up for it.
Moving on… Windows PowerShell. The new scripting technology from Microsoft. Let me just say, I’m not a programmer/scripter and never have been.
But I’ve recently started tinkering with this again. I say again, because I was first inspired to ‘play’ with this about a year ago when I was at a Technet briefing at MS and Thomas Lee (PCPro columnist) was showing it off. It was then know as Microsoft Scripting Host and was still in development. Thomas was really excited about WPS and that really came across, he spent quite a while showing what WPS could do, but more importantly how easy it was to use.
Thomas explained that MS had tried to design WPS to be an easy conversion whether you are used to Linux, or VB. The problem I had was I wasn’t used to either. I downloaded the BETA anyway and played. After a while I managed to get it to do some clever things (although most came from scribbling notes while watching Thomas). But I must admit I gave up after a while, I think partly due to the lack of support, and I didn’t really have a use for the scripts.
I have downloaded it again (after coming across it on the MS site), and started to use it again, I’ve already got further in an hour than I did before in 4 -5 hours. The main reason for this is due to the documentation and support from MS. When you install the software there are four Word documents installed with it, ranging from a quick start guide to a full user guide. There is also a Windows PowerShell Blog (see https://blogs.msdn.com/powershell/) which has links to helpful scripts, ideas, and training.
If you are a system administrator WPS could really save you some time, and make your life easier. I personally have found it much easier than any other language I’ve looked at.
Download Windows PowerShell at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/technologies/management/powershell/download.mspx where you will also find links to help.
I really am trying to get to grips with WPS and will hopefully be posting some success stories soon (fingers crossed) and possibly some scripts. If anyone else has thoughts, or ideas or anything that may help me please leave comments on here for me!