Category: PowerShell

Here’s a simple function that will get your system last bootup time.  Also, notice that I’m using the ‘-ErrorVariable ‘ parameter wth a given variable name ‘MyError‘ to trap any error messages during the execution of the ‘Get-WMIobject’ command.  That the same time I’m including the ‘-ErrorAction SilentlyContinue‘ so my function won’t abort while executing.

For the only argument needed in this function, I’m validating that the passing argument is not null (or empty).  Then, to build my result I’m using the scriptblocks to customized the results to be displayed on screen.

At the end, I’m collecting all thre information into the ‘$SvrRebooted‘ variable so it can be diaplayed when done.

[sourcecode language=”powershell”]
function Get-SystemLastBootUpTime{
Param(
[Parameter(Mandatory=$True, Position=0)][ValidateScript({$_ -ne $null})] [Array] $ComputerName
)
[Array] $SvrRebooted = $null;

$SvrRebooted = foreach($name in $ComputerName)
{
$x = get-wmiObject -Class Win32_OperatingSystem -Computername $name `
-ErrorAction ‘SilentlyContinue’ -ErrorVariable MyError;

if($($MyError | Select exception) -eq $Null)
{
$x | Select-Object `
@{Label = ‘ComputerName’; Expression = {$_.csname}}, `
@{Label = ‘Operating System’; Expression = {[string] (($_.Name).Split(‘|’)[0]);}}, `
@{Label = ‘MyLastBootUpTime’; Expression = {$_.ConvertToDateTime($_.LastBootUpTime)};}, `
@{Label = ‘Status’; Expression = {"Success"}};
}
else
{
$name | Select-Object `
@{Label = ‘ComputerName’; Expression = {$name}}, `
@{Label = ‘Operating System’; Expression = {$null}}, `
@{Label = ‘MyLastBootUpTime’; Expression = {$null}}, `
@{Label = ‘Status’; Expression = {‘Failed – ‘ `
+([string]([string] $MyError[0]).split("`n")).split("(E")[0];}};
};
};

$SvrRebooted;
};
[/sourcecode]

This function builds an array object.  Then you can use the ‘Format-Table‘ or the ‘Format-List‘ at your discretion. To execute the ‘Get-SystemLastBootUpTime’ function look at the following one-liners:

[sourcecode language=”powershell”]
## – Running the function:
[array] $svrList = @("Server1","Desktop2");
Get-SystemLastBootUpTime -ComputerName $svrList | Format-Table -AutoSize;
## – or
Get-SystemLastBootUpTime -ComputerName $svrList | Format-List;
[/sourcecode]

Enjoy!

Thanks to all South Florida IT Pro Camp organizers for having present at their event. Here’s the PowerShell presentation and demo scripts all consolidated into zipped file.

Feel free to contact me via email if you have any questions.

Thanks to all for attending my presentation.

Thank once again to the Palm Beach IT User Group for having my presenting live my session “PowerShell for the Administrator – All About The Language” on May 14th evening.   http://itportalregulus.blogspot.com/

The group had the opportunity to see the evolution from a single one-liner command, to a script file, a function, and a brief taste to a module.  Also, the scripts supplied has an abundant of code snippets that can be reused.

Also, giving example of reusing and modifying a community script (Thx, Jefferey Hicks for his contributions) so you can make it your own.

Here’s some reference links: http://jdhitsolutions.com/blog/2012/02/create-html-bar-charts-from-powershell/ and http://jdhitsolutions.com/blog/2011/12/friday-fun-drive-usage-console-graph/

Special Thanks to Sapien Technology for providing some books to giveaway and to Plurasight for the free one month online subscription.

Here’s the end result.  A function that check the machine disk space, build an HTML file with a graph and send an email thru your live.com SMTP server.

[sourcecode language=”powershell”]
function Get-DiskUsageHTMLGraph{
Param(
[array] $ComputerNames,
[string] $ReportPath = "c:\Temp\HTML_DiskSpace.html",
[boolean] $ViewReport,
[boolean] $SendEmail,
[Array] $SendTo
)

## – Set variable (no function):
$htmlTitle=’Server Drive(s) Report’

## – Configuring the HTML CSS Style sheet for the HTML code: (#FFFFCC)
## – When using Here-String/Splatting you must begin in the first position.
## – The use of Tab is invalid.
$head = @"

$($htmlTitle)

"@

## – Define the HTML Fragments as an Array type, add the header and title object:
[Array] $HTMLfragments = $null; $HTMLfragments += $head;
$HTMLfragments+="</pre>
<h1>Server Disk Space</h1>
<pre>

";

## – Build WMI Disk information object and group results by ComputerNames:
$SystemNames = get-wmiobject -Class Win32_logicaldisk -computer $ComputerNames `
| Group-Object -Property SystemName;

## – This is the graph character code:
[string] $gCode = [char] 9608;

## – Loop through each computer object found and create html fragments:
ForEach ($System in $SystemNames)
{
## – Get the System name:
$HTMLfragments+="</pre>
<h2>$($System.Name)</h2>
<pre>
"

## – Create an html fragment for each system found:
$html = $System.group `
| Where-Object {$_.DriveType -notmatch ‘5|2′} | Sort-Object -Property Name `
| Select-Object `
SystemName, @{Label = "DriveID";Expression={$_.Name}}, `
VolumeName, FileSystem, DriveType, `
@{Label="DiskSizeGB";Expression={"{0:N}" -f ($_.Size/1GB) -as [float]}}, `
@{Label="FreeSpaceGB";Expression={"{0:N}" -f ($_.FreeSpace/1GB) -as [float]}}, `
@{Label="PercFree";Expression={"{0:N}" -f ($_.FreeSpace/$_.Size*100) -as [float]}}, `
@{Label="Low if(($_.FreeSpace/$_.Size*100) -le ’15’) `
{ `
"- Critical -"; `
} `
Else `
{ `
$null; `
}; `
}}, `
@{Name="";Expression={ `
$UsedPer = (($_.Size – $_.Freespace)/$_.Size)*100; `
$UsedGraph = $gCode * ($UsedPer/2); `
$FreeGraph = $gCode * ((100-$UsedPer)/2); `
"xltFont color=Redxgt{0}xlt/FontxgtxltFont Color=Greenxgt{1}xlt/fontxgt" `
-f $usedGraph,$FreeGraph; `
}} | ConvertTo-Html -Fragment;

## – Replacing replace the tag place holders: (Jefferey’s hack at work)
$html=$html -replace ‘xlt’,’
## – Add the Disk information results to the HTML fragment:
$HTMLfragments+=$html;

## – Insert a line break for each computer it find:
$HTMLfragments+="
";
}

## – Add a footer to HTML code:
$footer=("
<em>Report run {0} by {1}\{2}<em>" -f (Get-Date -displayhint date),$env:userdomain,$env:username)
$HTMLfragments+=$footer

## – Write HTML code to a file on disk:
ConvertTo-Html -head $head -body $HTMLfragments | Out-File $ReportPath;

if($ViewReport -eq $true)
{
ii $ReportPath;
}

if($SendEmail -eq $true)
{
## – Setting the information for hotmail:
$MyEmailAcct = "UserX@live.com";
$MyPassword = ConvertTo-SecureString ‘$myPassword!’ -AsPlainText -Force;
$MyCredentials = new-object -typename System.Management.Automation.PSCredential -argumentlist $MyEmailAcct,$MyPassword
[Array] $emaillist = @(‘User1@gmail.com’,’UserX@live.com’);

## – OR, send it as a body message in the email:
$GetError = $null;
Send-MailMessage `
-From ‘MySysAdmin-DoNotReply@MySysAdmin.com’ `
-To $SendTo `
-Subject "Diskspace Information for the date – $((Get-Date).ToString("MMddyyyy, HH:MM"))" `
-BodyAsHtml ([string] (ConvertTo-Html -head $head -body $HTMLfragments)) `
-SmtpServer ‘smtp.live.com’ `
-Credential $MyCredentials `
-UseSsl `
-Port 587 `
-ErrorAction SilentlyContinue `
-ErrorVariable GetError;

if($GetError -ne $null)
{
$date = (get-Date).ToString("MMddyyyy_HHMMss");
"Sender: $($getCred1.UserName) `r`n $GetError" | `
Out-File -FilePath "C:\Temp\log\emailerror_$date.txt";
};
};
};

[/sourcecode]

Sample results for email to live.com:

Sample Browser:

Here’s the zipped presentation link: