- #Learn powershell toolmaking with sapien powershell studio code#
- #Learn powershell toolmaking with sapien powershell studio windows#
Simply pass different values to the parameters. It requires a little more work to execute it, but you don't have to change anything in the script if you want to provision a new username. \New-UserProvision.ps1 –Username abertram –OUPath 'OU=MyUsers,DC=lab,DC=local' –HomeFolderPath '\\fileserver\Home\abertram' Rather than just running the script New-UserProvision.ps1, we now must execute it and pass the parameters at run time. It must be run with the parameter values filled in to do anything. We can't just execute it and expect it to do everything it did before.
#Learn powershell toolmaking with sapien powershell studio code#
New-Item –Path $HomeFolderPath –Type DirectoryĪs it is, this code isn't going to do much. I can now replace the static entries in the script with the parameter variables. You can see that I've created a variable for each of the pieces that I believe might change when running this code for other users. This is what we're going to focus on in this article, but parameters can get much more advanced. A basic parameter can be defined as a simple variable as seen below. We create parameters by setting up a parameter block at the top of the script, followed by one or more individual parameters. Related Article: PowerShell Script: Developing A HTTP Script Monitor In PowerShell These are the items you should convert into parameters. What might change are things like the username, the path where the user is created in AD, and the home folder path. Our command references are not going to change. We know that we'll always want to create an AD user and create a home folder for every user. First, we'll need to decide which parts might change in the future. Let's use our previous example again, only this time we're going to create a tool rather than a disposable script.
#Learn powershell toolmaking with sapien powershell studio windows#
Related Article: Using The PowerShell Test-NetConnection Cmdlet On Windows Parameters allow you to modify the functionality of the script without actually changing the script. Parameters are ways to set placeholders for things that might change in the future. One of the easiest ways to make a script or function more reusable is to add parameters. The most important distinction between a simple script and a tool is reusability. The script will need to be refactored to be reusable. To use a script like this in the long term is not feasible. It gets the job done, but what happens when you want to perform this task again? You'll have to change the Name and Path parameters for New-AdUser and also the Path parameter for New-Item. New-Item –Path '\\fileserver\Home\abertram' –Type Directory New-AdUser –Name abertram –Path 'OU=MyUsers,DC=lab,DC=local' A disposable script called New-UserProvision.ps1 might look something like: For example, imagine you need to make a script that creates an Active Directory user and a home folder. It's a script or function that's built in a way that allows you to quickly pass different parameters to make it work differently. What do I mean by "tools"? I'm referring to using PowerShell Toolmaking to write a piece of code that's built for reuse and modularity. Related Article: Automate Data Encryption Using PowerShell Tools vs. It's time to build PowerShell "tools" rather than disposable scripts. It's not until you repeat this process a few times that you realize you need to take your scripting skills to another level. This is because scripts have traditionally been treated as disposable. A few weeks go by and we begrudgingly write another script to do task X again. We write a script to do task X, another to do task Y, then task Z comes around. As we use PowerShell Toolmaking to automate more tasks, most of us eventually find ourselves reinventing the wheel.