input objects in powershell jobs - powershell

I'm trying to implement a job in PowerShell that would look something like this:
$cred = Get-Credential
$job1 = Start-Job -InputObject $cred -ScriptBlock {
Get-ADUser -Credential $cred -Filter *
}
$res1 = Wait-Job -Job $job1 | Receive-Job
But I am receiving an error message:
"Wait-Job : The Wait-Job cmdlet cannot finish working, because one or more jobs are blocked waiting for user interaction. Process interactive job output by using the Receive-Job cmdlet, and then try again.
....
Deadlock detected: (System.Manageme...n.PSRemotingJob:PSRemotingJob) [Wait-J
ob],
....
"
But if I create this seemingly identical job like this:
$job2 = Start-Job -ScriptBlock {
$pass = ConvertTo-SecureString "pass" -AsPlainText -Force
$cred = new-object -typename System.Management.Automation.PSCredential -argumentlist "usr",$pass
Get-ADUser -Credential $cred -Filter *
}
$res2 = Wait-Job -Job $job2 | Receive-Job
Everything works perfectly.
Can you please help me understand why?
Thanks!

To pass arguments to the script block, you need to use the -ArgumentList parameter, not -InputObject. Try this:
$cred = Get-Credential
$job1 = Start-Job -ScriptBlock {PARAM($cred)
Get-ADUser -Credential $cred -Filter *
} -ArgumentList $cred
Note that -ArgumentList has to be the last parameter in the Start-Job command.

Well, this would probably be evident if you had but read the Help for Start-Job. If you use the -InputObject argument you then reference it from within the scriptblock with the automatic variable $Input. Since you reference $Cred out of scope like that it's trying to get credentials again. Here's the Help text for that parameter.
-InputObject <PSObject>
Specifies input to the command. Enter a variable that contains the objects, or type a command or expression that generates the objects.
In the value of the ScriptBlock parameter, use the $input automatic variable to represent the input objects.
You could alter your script to look like this and it should work fine:
$cred = Get-Credential
$job1 = Start-Job -InputObject $cred -ScriptBlock {
Get-ADUser -Credential $Input -Filter *
}
$res1 = Wait-Job -Job $job1 | Receive-Job

Related

Restart machine using powershell script

I am running the below code but the restart is not working. My intention was to run restart command parallelly on all remote machines at once.
$YourFile = gc "machinelst.txt"
$username = "user1"
$password = "pass1"
$secpw = ConvertTo-SecureString $password -AsPlainText -Force
$cred = New-Object Management.Automation.PSCredential ($username, $secpw)
foreach ($computer in $YourFile)
{
Invoke-Command -ComputerName $computer -credential $cred -ErrorAction Stop -ScriptBlock { Restart-Computer -ComputerName $computer -Force } -AsJob
}
That looks like its the output from Get-Job - could you try Receive-Job $id (Receive-Job 80).
Should give you the actual exception.
This likely runs in parallel just like invoke-command does with an array of computernames:
restart-computer computer01,computer02,computer03,computer04,computer05
Or this. It takes a couple minutes for the winrm service to come back, but they all seem to reboot at the same time.
$c = get-credential
$list = 1..10 | % tostring computer00
restart-computer $list -wait -protocol wsman -cr $c
try this (you will can add -asjob if it's work) :
$username = "yourdomain\user1"
$password = ConvertTo-SecureString "pass1" -AsPlainText -Force
$cred = new-object -typename System.Management.Automation.PSCredential -argumentlist $username, $password
get-content "machinelst.txt" | %{
Restart-Computer -ComputerName $_ -Authentication default -Credential $cred
}
if you want use job, you can do it :
$listjob=#()
get-content "machinelst.txt" | %{
$listjob+=Restart-Computer -ComputerName $_ -Authentication default -Credential $cred -AsJob
}
$listjob | Wait-Job -Timeout 30
$listjob | %{
if ($_.State -eq 'Failed' )
{
Receive-Job -Job $_ -Keep
}
}

PowerShell script module doesn't return any info

I have the following module:
Function Get-ProcessHash {
param($ComputerName)
$username = $ComputerName + '\localadm'
$password = ConvertTo-SecureString 'supersecret' -AsPlainText -Force
$cred = New-Object -typename System.Management.Automation.PSCredential -ArgumentList $username, $password
Invoke-Command -ComputerName $ComputerName -Credential $cred -Authentication Negotiate -ScriptBlock {
Get-Process * | Select-Object Id, Name, ProductVersion, Company, Path, #{l="SHA256";e={if ($_.Path -ne $null) { (Get-FileHash $_.Path).Hash}}}
}
}
This script module is located at C:\Users\<username>\Documents\WindowsPowerShell\Modules\SuperModule\SuperModule.psm1. I can see its functions via Get-Command -Module SuperModule. If I run the content of the script manually, outside of the function, it will work and return all the values, but when I try to run the function as PS C:\Users\<username>\Documents\Scripts> Get-ProcessHash US0001 it doesn't return a thing.
The credentials are valid, I can execute the script outside of the module and it works.
As Matt said in the comments, the solution was simple:
"Have you been making changes to this module while it was loaded? If you close all active PowerShell sessions and try again is your issue the same?"

Remote management with powershell

I'm trying to get some information from several machines on the network but I get loads of entries of the local machine.. for each entry in the text file I get an entry from the local machine.
Any idea where I'm going wrong.. winrm is configured on the remote machines and running.
$Username = Read-Host "Please enter Username"
$Password = read-host "please enter Password"
$pass = ConvertTo-SecureString -AsPlainText $Password -Force
$Cred = New-Object System.Management.Automation.PSCredential -ArgumentList $Username,$pass
$computers = gc c:\test\file.txt
foreach ($Computer in $computers)
{
Invoke-command -ComputerName $computers -credential $cred -ErrorAction Stop -ScriptBlock {Invoke-Expression -Command:"cmd.exe /c 'ipconfig'" | out-file c:\test\output.txt -append}
}
cls
Thanks in advance :)
Invoke-Command will take an array for the ComputerName param so you can use $computers instead of using a foreach loop (assuming that you have one computer name per-line in the file).
I've also used Get-Credential to prompt for the full credential in one go rather than asking for username and password individually.
$Cred = Get-Credential
$computers = Get-Content c:\test\file.txt
Invoke-Command -ComputerName $computers -Credential $cred -ErrorAction Stop -ScriptBlock {Invoke-Expression -Command:"cmd.exe /c 'ipconfig'" | Out-File c:\test\output.txt -Append}
The reason you are only seeing a single computers info in c:\test\output.txt is because the output of the the ipconfig command is being saved to the remote computer... so you will have a c:\test\output.txt file on each computer you run the command against.
EDIT:
To take the output of each remote command and save it to your local computer just move the Out-File outside the Invoke-Command like this:
$Cred = Get-Credential
$computers = Get-Content c:\test\file.txt
Invoke-Command -ComputerName $computers -Credential $cred -ErrorAction Stop -ScriptBlock {Invoke-Expression -Command:"cmd.exe /c 'ipconfig'"} | Out-File c:\test\output.txt -Append
The issue is you are iterating one by one but you are not passing one by one to the invoke-command, $computer will have each value at a time in the foreach loop.
Instead of this:
foreach ($Computer in $computers)
{
Invoke-command -ComputerName $computers -credential $cred -ErrorAction Stop -ScriptBlock {Invoke-Expression -Command:"cmd.exe /c 'ipconfig'" | out-file c:\test\output.txt -append}
}
Do this:
foreach ($Computer in $computers)
{
Invoke-command -ComputerName $computer -credential $cred -ErrorAction Stop -ScriptBlock {Invoke-Expression -Command:"cmd.exe /c 'ipconfig'" | out-file c:\test\output.txt -append}
}
Further improvement:
You do not have to give Invoke-Expression -Command:"cmd.exe /c 'ipconfig'"
Instead of this,you can directly use ipconfig inside the scriptblock.

Running Batch Script on remote Server via PowerShell

I need to connect to some remote servers from a client (same domain as the servers) once connected, I need to run a batch file:
I've done so with this code:
$Username = 'USER'
$Password = 'PASSWORD'
$pass = ConvertTo-SecureString -AsPlainText $Password -Force
$Cred = New-Object System.Management.Automation.PSCredential -ArgumentList $Username,$pass
try {
Invoke-Command -ComputerName "SERVER1" -Credential $Cred -ScriptBlock -ErrorAction Stop {
Start-Process "C:\Users\nithi.sundar\Desktop\Test.bat"
}
} catch {
Write-Host "error"
}
This script does not give any errors, but it doesn't seem to be executing the batch script.
any input on this would be greatly appreciated.
Try replacing
invoke-command -computername "SERVER1" -credential $Cred -ScriptBlock -ErrorAction stop { Start-Process "C:\Users\nithi.sundar\Desktop\Test.bat" }
with
Invoke-Command -ComputerName "Server1" -credential $cred -ErrorAction Stop -ScriptBlock {Invoke-Expression -Command:"cmd.exe /c 'C:\Users\nithi.sund
ar\Desktop\Test.bat'"}
It's not possible that the code you posted ran without errors, because you messed up the order of the argument to Invoke-Command. This:
Invoke-Command ... -ScriptBlock -ErrorAction Stop { ... }
should actually look like this:
Invoke-Command ... -ErrorAction Stop -ScriptBlock { ... }
Also, DO NOT use Invoke-Expression for this. It's practically always the wrong tool for whatever you need to accomplish. You also don't need Start-Process since PowerShell can run batch scripts directly:
Invoke-Command -ComputerName "SERVER1" -ScriptBlock {
C:\Users\nithi.sundar\Desktop\Test.bat
} -Credential $Cred -ErrorAction Stop
If the command is a string rather than a bare word you need to use the call operator, though:
Invoke-Command -ComputerName "SERVER1" -ScriptBlock {
& "C:\Users\nithi.sundar\Desktop\Test.bat"
} -Credential $Cred -ErrorAction Stop
You could also invoke the batch file with cmd.exe:
Invoke-Command -ComputerName "SERVER1" -ScriptBlock {
cmd /c "C:\Users\nithi.sundar\Desktop\Test.bat"
} -Credential $Cred -ErrorAction Stop
If for some reason you must use Start-Process you should add the parameters -NoNewWindow and -Wait.
Invoke-Command -ComputerName "SERVER1" -ScriptBlock {
Start-Process 'C:\Users\nithi.sundar\Desktop\Test.bat' -NoNewWindow -Wait
} -Credential $Cred -ErrorAction Stop
By default Start-Process runs the invoked process asynchronously (i.e. the call returns immediately) and in a separate window. That is most likely the reason why your code didn't work as intended.

invoke-expression inside scriptblock of invoke-command not working

I've got the following script
$name = (Invoke-Command -ComputerName "STW111" -Credential $cred -ScriptBlock { Invoke-Expression "C:\PSS\User Tool\UserTool.exe"} -AsJob).Name
Wait-Job -Name $name
This not working, however, if I move the usertool to c:\pss\, it works fine.
$name = (Invoke-Command -ComputerName "STW111" -Credential $cred -ScriptBlock { Invoke-Expression "C:\PSS\UserTool.exe"} -AsJob).Name
Wait-Job -Name $name
I really need to get to grips with escaping in Powershell.
Any ideas?
TIA
try this:
Invoke-Expression "& 'C:\PSS\User Tool\UserTool.exe'"