Get Process Location Path using PowerShell - powershell

Question

I am trying to get the location of currently running process on your computer using PowerShell.
Example
C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox
C:\Windows\sysWOW64\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0
C:\Program Files (x86)\Internet Explorer
When I run the command
$path = Get-Process | Select-Object Path
Split-Path $path
I get the following output, which I not what I want. Why does it add #{Path=?
#{Path=C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox
#{Path=C:\Windows\sysWOW64\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0
#{Path=C:\Program Files (x86)\Internet Explorer
When I run Split-Path as follows, it gives me the correct output C:\Windows\sysWOW64\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0.
$pshpath = "C:\Windows\sysWOW64\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe"
Split-Path $pshpath

Answer 1

$path = Get-Process | Select-Object Path
returns an array of objects. Each object in the array will have the property 'Path' along with an optional value.
The 'path' parameter of split-path takes 'string' arguments so when you run
Split-Path $path
i guess each object is being converted to type string so you get the hashtable format output.
split-path can accept path values from pipeline by property name so you can do:
$path | Split-path
if you just want the path perhaps you could try:
Get-Process | Select-Object -ExpandProperty Path

Answer 2

To get a list of all paths just use:
ps | % {$_.Path}
or full syntax:
Get-Process | ForEach-Object {$_.Path}
when using:
$path = Get-Process | Select-Object Path
lets look at what $path is:
$path | Get-Member
and you get:
TypeName: Selected.System.Diagnostics.Process
Name MemberType Definition
---- ---------- ----------
Equals Method bool Equals(System.Object obj)
GetHashCode Method int GetHashCode()
GetType Method type GetType()
ToString Method string ToString()
Path NoteProperty System.String Path=C:\windows\system32\atieclxx.exe
so Path is not a String but a NoteProperty, I guess that's why you can't use Split-Path directly.

Answer 3

Another way of getting the path is by doing something like this:
(Get-Process -Name firefox).path
But, since one process can appear multiple times (I'm looking at you, chrome.exe), you'd get the same path repeated as many times as the process appears in the process list. IMO, a better way of getting the path is by process id (1234 as an example):
(Get-Process -Id 1234).path
Or, if you're not sure what your process' id is, you could loop through all the running processes, and then check each of them individually, piping the results to a file, for later analysis. For example:
$processList = Get-Process #let's get all the processes at once
$newline = "`r`n"
$tabChar = "`t"
$separator = "--------"
$file = "C:\Users\Admin\Desktop\proc-loc.txt" # where do we want to pipe out the output
Write-Output "Processes $newLine $separator" > $file # out with the previous contents of the file, let's start anew
# let's loop through the list, and pick out the stuff we need
foreach($item in $processList) {
$itemObject = $item | Select-Object
$itemName = $itemObject.Name
$itemId = $itemObject.Id
$itemPath = (Get-Process -Id $itemId).path
Write-Output "$itemId $tabChar $itemName $tabChar $itemPath" >> $file
}
If you're interested in getting the running services as well, you could expand on the previous bit, with this:
$serviceList = Get-WmiObject win32_service | Where {$_.state -eq "Running"}
Write-Output "$newline $newline Services $newline $separator" >> $file
foreach($item in $serviceList) {
$itemName = $item.Name
$itemId = $item.ProcessId
$itemPath = $item.PathName
Write-Output "$itemId $tabChar $itemName $tabChar $itemPath" >> $file
}
One thing to note, though - this won't give you a path for each and every process currently running on your system. For example, SgrmBroker, smss, System and some instances of svchost won't have a path attached to them in your output file.

Answer 4

Just remove that split-path command and give a object parameter as stated below.
$path = Get-Process | Select-Object Path
$path.path
And output would be as stated below.
C:\Program Files (x86)\Citrix\ICA Client\SelfServicePlugin\SelfServicePlugin.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\SettingSyncHost.exe
C:\Windows\SystemApps\ShellExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\ShellExperienceHost.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\sihost.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe