PowerShell Getting Started

Intro

PowerShell can be used to codify Microsoft Windows environments. This post covers the basics of getting started with PowerShell.

Software

The following software was used in this post.

• Windows - 10
• PowerShell - 5.1.19041.1023

Cmdlets

Get a list of cmdlets

Get-Command

Getting Help

Get help for a cmdlet

help <cmdlet>

PowerShell ships with a minimal help system. To update the help system use the following cmdlet

Udpate-Help

Aliases

Many common unix/linux commands are aliased to windows commands. The get a list of aliases use the Get-Alias cmdlet.

Get-Alias

Finding the Version

To get the PowerShell Engine version, get the PSVersion key from the $PSVersionTable hash table.

$PSVersionTable.PSVersion

# output

Major  Minor  Build  Revision
-----  -----  -----  --------
5      1      19041  1023