Master PowerShell Tricks Volume 1
Master PowerShell Tricks Volume 1
About the Book
There are many cool things about Windows PowerShell. For me three of the most awesome things are the following:
1. If you don’t like the way Windows PowerShell does things, you can change it.
2. If Windows PowerShell can’t do something you need, you can add it.
3. The Windows PowerShell community is super dedicated, and will help you do both one and two.
Now, to be honest at times, it is necessary to write hundreds and hundreds of lines of arcane code, to dive into the deepest and darkest mysteries of programing, and even to learn about things like API’s, Constructors, Events, threading, ACL’s, DACL’s, CACL’s and maybe even Tetradactylies. Then again, most of the time it is not. In fact, it has been years and years since I wrote a hundreds and hundreds of lines of arcane code.
It is almost as if the Windows PowerShell team deliberately tried to make Windows PowerShell easy to use and easy to learn. Hmm … I wonder if that approach would ever catch on? Anyway, there used to be an old saw: “Ease of use is directly opposed to program capability.” Or, in other words, if it is easy to use, it probably is not all that powerful. Well, PowerShell changes that … dramatically.
And yet, Windows PowerShell is also deceptively easy to use. One can go from Get-Service and Get-Process or even Get-Date to some pretty complicated stuff in like one line of code.
This is why item number three is so important. The authors of this book: Dave, Sean, Thomas and Allan are all Windows PowerShell experts, and have even been recognized by Microsoft as community leaders. So, this means not only do they know their stuff, but they are also great at sharing that knowledge with the community. Sean Kearney is even an Honorary Scripting Guy – a very elite group indeed!
One of the great way that MVP’s share their knowledge and experience is via MVP Days a traveling road show that was started by Dave and Cristal Kawula. This is a very well run event, and I have had the opportunity to speak at two of the events … it is cool, and it is fun.
So grab this book, get it autographed, and learn how to master some awesome PowerShell tricks. It is cool.
Ed Wilson
Microsoft Scripting Guy
@ScriptingGuys
Bundles that include this book
Table of Contents
Foreword Ed Wilson “The Scripting Guy” iii
Acknowledgements v
From Dave v
About the Authors vi
Dave Kawula - MVP vi
Sean Kearney - MVP vii
Thomas Rayner - MVP vii
Allan Rafuse – MVP vii
Ed Wilson – The Scripting Guy viii
Technical Editors ix
Cristal Kawula – MVP ix
Emile Cabot - MVP ix
Contents xi
Introduction 1
North American MVPDays Community Roadshow 1
Structure of the Book 1
Sample Files 2
Additional Resources 3
Chapter 1 5
Simulating a Ransomware Attack with PowerShell 5
But how does one test for Ransomware detection? 5
The Code 6
Chapter 2 8
Retrieving the Distribution Lists a User is a Member Of 8
The Code 9
Chapter 3 10
Identifying Large Exchange Mailbox Folders via PowerShell 10
The Code 11
Chapter 4 14
Deploying a Domain Joined Nano Server via PowerShell 14
PowerShell Cmdlets for the Network Stack 15
Chapter 5 19
Enabling Auto Notification of Specific File Changes 19
The Code 19
Chapter 6 21
Copying the Output of the last PowerShell command to the clipboard 21
The Code 21
Chapter 7 23
Validate the Length of An Integer 23
The Code 23
Chapter 8 24
Allow a Null Value for An Object That Doesn’t Normally Allow it 24
Chapter 9 25
Getting Started with Pester 25
Chapter 10 29
Find missing Subnets in AD Sites and Services 29
Cloud Environments 29
Solution 29
Things to thing about 30
The Code 30
Chapter 11 32
Copy Directories/Files to a list of Remote Computers 32
Here-Strings to the Rescue 33
Chapter 12 36
Making the Configuration Manager PowerShell Module Discoverable 36
The Code 37
Chapter 13 39
Resolving issues with slow Outbound mail in Office 365 in a Hybrid connection using a SmartHost or Internal Appliance 39
Chapter 14 43
Use PowerShell to Work with Data from OMS 43
Parsing MS OMS data with PowerShell 43
Importing the CSV file using PowerShell 44
Chapter 15 50
Use PowerShell to Explore Office 365 Installation 50
Chapter 16 53
PowerShell 5 Classes: Constructor Overloading 53
What’s an overload anyway? 53
Creating overloaded constructors 55
Chapter 17 58
Filtering Event Logs with PowerShell 58
Seven parameter sets 58
Chapter 18 64
Use the PowerShell 5 Convert-String Cmdlet 64
Convert-String 64
The old flipty dipty 64
Expanding the string idea 65
Chapter 19 67
Use PowerShell to Detect if a Location is a Directory or a Symlink 67
Chapter 20 68
Bypassing PowerShell Execution Policy 68
Chapter 20 70
Starting up and Shutting down a list of VM’s in a specific order 70
Chapter 21 72
Join us at MVPDays and meet great MVP’s like this in person 72
Live Presentations 72
Video Training 72
Live Instructor-led Classes 72
Consulting Services 73
Twitter 74
Other books by these authors
The Leanpub 60-day 100% Happiness Guarantee
Within 60 days of purchase you can get a 100% refund on any Leanpub purchase, in two clicks.
See full terms
Do Well. Do Good.
Authors have earned$11,841,865writing, publishing and selling on Leanpub, earning 80% royalties while saving up to 25 million pounds of CO2 and up to 46,000 trees.
Learn more about writing on Leanpub
Free Updates. DRM Free.
If you buy a Leanpub book, you get free updates for as long as the author updates the book! Many authors use Leanpub to publish their books in-progress, while they are writing them. All readers get free updates, regardless of when they bought the book or how much they paid (including free).
Most Leanpub books are available in PDF (for computers) and EPUB (for phones, tablets and Kindle). The formats that a book includes are shown at the top right corner of this page.
Finally, Leanpub books don't have any DRM copy-protection nonsense, so you can easily read them on any supported device.
Learn more about Leanpub's ebook formats and where to read them
Top Books
- #1
The Hitchhiker's Guide to DFIR: Experiences From Beginners and Experts
Barry Grundy, Tristram, John Haynes, ApexPredator, Andrew Rathbun, Kevin Pagano, Victor Heiland, Nisarg Suthar, Guus Beckers, and Jason WilkinsA first of its kind crowdsourced DFIR book written on GitHub by the members of the Digital Forensics Discord Server to share knowledge!
- #2
OpenIntro Statistics
David Diez, Christopher Barr, Mine Cetinkaya-Rundel, and OpenIntroA complete foundation for Statistics, also serving as a foundation for Data Science.
Leanpub revenue supports OpenIntro (US-based nonprofit) so we can provide free desk copies to teachers interested in using OpenIntro Statistics in the classroom and expand the project to support free textbooks in other subjects.
More resources: openintro.org.
- #3
Ansible for DevOps
Jeff GeerlingAnsible is a simple, but powerful, server and configuration management tool. Learn to use Ansible effectively, whether you manage one server—or thousands.
- #4
R Programming for Data Science
Roger D. PengThis book brings the fundamentals of R programming to you, using the same material developed as part of the industry-leading Johns Hopkins Data Science Specialization. The skills taught in this book will lay the foundation for you to begin your journey learning data science. Printed copies of this book are available through Lulu.
- #5
Maîtriser Apache JMeter
Philippe Mouawad, Bruno Demion (Milamber), and Antonio Gomes RodriguesToute la puissance d'Apache JMeter expliquée par ses commiteurs et utilisateurs experts. De l'intégration continue en passant par le Cloud, vous découvrirez comment intégrer JMeter à vos processus "Agile" et Devops.
If you're looking for the newer english version of this book, go to Master JMeter : From load testing to DevOps
- #6
Software Architecture for Developers
Simon BrownA developer-friendly, practical and pragmatic guide to lightweight software architecture, technical leadership and the balance with agility.
- #7
Introduction to Data Science
Rafael A IrizarryThe demand for skilled data science practitioners in industry, academia, and government is rapidly growing. This book introduces concepts from probability, statistical inference, linear regression and machine learning and R programming skills. Throughout the book we demonstrate how these can help you tackle real-world data analysis challenges.
- #8
Concurrency with Modern C++
Rainer GrimmC++11 is the first C++ standard that deals with concurrency. The story goes on with C++17, C++20, and will continue with C++23.
I'll give you a detailed insight into the current and the upcoming concurrency in C++. This insight includes the theory and a lot of practice.
- #9
Optics By Example
Chris PennerA comprehensive example-driven guide to optics. Examples in Haskell, but adaptable to other languages.
Become a data-manipulation wizard using optics to manipulate data!
This book takes you from beginner to advanced using Lenses, Traversals, Prisms, and more!
- #10
Functional Event-Driven Architecture
Gabriel VolpeExplore the event-driven architecture (EDA) in a purely functional way. Learn to design and develop distributed systems that scale. Identify common design patterns in such systems.
Take your functional programming skills to the next level by joining me in developing a distributed system powered by Apache Pulsar and Fs2 streams, all in Scala 3!
Top Bundles
- #1
CCIE Service Provider Ultimate Study Bundle
2 Books
Piotr Jablonski, Lukasz Bromirski, and Nick Russo have joined forces to deliver the only CCIE Service Provider training resource you'll ever need. This bundle contains a detailed and challenging collection of workbook labs, plus an extensively detailed technical reference guide. All of us have earned the CCIE Service Provider certification... - #2
Practical FP in Scala + Functional event-driven architecture
2 Books
Practical FP in Scala (A hands-on approach) & Functional event-driven architecture, aka FEDA, (Powered by Scala 3), together as a bundle! The content of PFP in Scala is a requirement to understand FEDA so why not take advantage of this bundle!? - #3
Software Architecture
2 Books
"Software Architecture for Developers" is a practical and pragmatic guide to modern, lightweight software architecture, specifically aimed at developers. You'll learn:The essence of software architecture.Why the software architecture role should include coding, coaching and collaboration.The things that you really need to think about before... - #4
Modern C++ Collection
3 Books
Get All about Modern C++C++ Standard Library, including C++20Concurrency with Modern C++, including C++20C++20Each book has about 200 complete code examples. Updates are included. When I update one of the books, you immediately get the updated bundle. You can expect significant updates to each new C++ standard (C++23, C++26, .. ) and also... - #5
Pattern-Oriented Memory Forensics and Malware Detection
2 Books
This training bundle for security engineers and researchers, malware and memory forensics analysts includes two accelerated training courses for Windows memory dump analysis using WinDbg. It is also useful for technical support and escalation engineers who analyze memory dumps from complex software environments and need to check for possible... - #6
All the Books of The Medical Futurist
6 Books
We put together the most popular books from The Medical Futurist to provide a clear picture about the major trends shaping the future of medicine and healthcare. Digital health technologies, artificial intelligence, the future of 20 medical specialties, big pharma, data privacy, digital health investments and how technology giants such as Amazon... - #9
Learn Git, Bash, and Terraform the Hard Way
3 Books
Learn Git, Bash and Terraform using the Hard Way method.These technologies are essential tools in the DevOps armoury. These books walk you through their features and subtleties in a simple, gradual way that reinforces learning rather than baffling you with theory. - #10
Static Analysis and Automated Refactoring
2 Books
As PHP developers we are living in the "Age of Static Analysis". We can use a tool like PHPStan to learn about potential bugs before we ship our code to production, and we can enforce our team's programming standards using custom PHPStan rules. Recipes for Decoupling by Matthias Noback teaches you in great detail how to do this, while also...
