PowerShell Automation: Getting Started Guide

Table of Contents

One script can save hours of manual work every week.

Opening PowerShell

Your First Commands

Try these to get comfortable:

# Get computer information

# List running services Get-Service | Where-Object Status -eq "Running"

# Check disk space Get-PSDrive -PSProvider FileSystem ```

Understanding the Verb-Noun Pattern

PowerShell commands (cmdlets) follow a consistent pattern:

Example 1: User Onboarding Script

Creating new users manually is tedious and error-prone:

# Create new AD user with standard settings

New-ADUser -Name "John Smith" -GivenName "John" -Surname "Smith" -SamAccountName "jsmith" -UserPrincipalName "jsmith@company.com" -Path "OU=Users,DC=company,DC=com" -AccountPassword $Password -ChangePasswordAtLogon $true -Enabled $true

# Add to standard groups Add-ADGroupMember -Identity "All Employees" -Members "jsmith" ```

Example 2: Stale Computer Cleanup

Find computers that haven't logged in recently:

# Find computers inactive for 90+ days

Get-ADComputer -Filter {LastLogonDate -lt $90DaysAgo} -Properties LastLogonDate | Select-Object Name, LastLogonDate | Export-Csv "StaleComputers.csv" -NoTypeInformation ```

Example 3: Disk Space Monitoring

Check disk space across multiple servers:

foreach ($Server in $Servers) { Get-WmiObject Win32_LogicalDisk -ComputerName $Server | Where-Object DriveType -eq 3 | Select-Object @{N="Server";E={$Server}}, DeviceID, @{N="SizeGB";E={[math]::Round($_.Size/1GB,2)}}, @{N="FreeGB";E={[math]::Round($_.FreeSpace/1GB,2)}}, @{N="PercentFree";E={[math]::Round($_.FreeSpace/$_.Size*100,2)}} } ```

Example 4: Microsoft 365 License Report

See who has which licenses:

# Connect to Microsoft Graph

# Get all licensed users Get-MgUser -All -Property DisplayName,UserPrincipalName,AssignedLicenses | Where-Object AssignedLicenses | Select-Object DisplayName, UserPrincipalName | Export-Csv "LicensedUsers.csv" -NoTypeInformation ```

Create a script file (.ps1) and schedule it with Task Scheduler:

1. Open Task Scheduler
2. Create Basic Task
3. Set trigger (daily, weekly, etc.)
4. Action: Start a program
5. Program: powershell.exe
6. Arguments: -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File "C:\Scripts\YourScript.ps1"

1. Test Before Automating

Always test with -WhatIf when available:

Remove-ADUser -Identity "jsmith" -WhatIf

2. Add Error Handling

try {
    # Your code here
    Get-ADUser -Identity "jsmith"
}
catch {
    Write-Error "Failed: $_"
    # Log or notify
}

3. Log Everything

Start-Transcript -Path "C:\Logs\Script-$(Get-Date -Format 'yyyyMMdd').log"
# Your script here
Stop-Transcript

4. Use Comments

# This script checks for inactive users
# Author: IT Team
# Last Updated: 2024-09-15

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