how to establish and enter a remote session using runspace in powershell - powershell

Question

I am trying to establish a session with a remote host B from my machine A, within a C# code. I am using runspace API for that. the code snippet is provided below
Runspace runspace = RunspaceFactory.CreateRunspace();
runspace.Open();
//constructing the vmname parameter here
vmname = useralias + DateTime.Now.ToString();
Pipeline pipeline = runspace.CreatePipeline();
string scripttext = "$secpasswd = ConvertTo-SecureString '222_bbbb' -AsPlainText –Force";
string scripttext1 = "$mycreds = New-object -typename System.Management.Automation.PSCredential('TS-TEST-09\\Administrator',$secpasswd)";
string scripttext2 = "$s = New-PSSession -ComputerName TS-TEST-09 -Credential $mycreds";
//not accepting session string here, only computername acceptable
**string scripttext3 = "Enter-PSSession -Session $s";**
//Command cmd = new Command(#"C:\mypath\helper.ps1", true);
//cmd.Parameters.Add("local_useralias", useralias);
//cmd.Parameters.Add("local_vmname", vmname);
//cmd.Parameters.Add("local_datastore", datastoredropdown.Text.ToString());
//cmd.Parameters.Add("local_architecture", architecturedropdown.Text.ToString());
pipeline.Commands.AddScript(scripttext);
pipeline.Commands.AddScript(scripttext1);
pipeline.Commands.AddScript(scripttext2);
pipeline.Commands.AddScript(scripttext3);
//pipeline.Commands.Add(cmd);
Collection<PSObject> results = pipeline.Invoke();
runspace.Close();
this code is expected to enter into a session with machine TS-TEST-09 and invoke the script helper.ps1 existing on that machine(that part is commented out in the code currently as i am not able to enter into the session with remote host).
now the problem is that i can't enter into the session $s using -Session parameter(highlighted at scripttext3) however i can enter into it using -Computername parameter.
the error that i get when using -Session parameter in scripttext3 is :
at
invokedSystem.Management.Automation.Internal.Host.InteralHost.GetIHostSupportsInteractiveSession()
at invokedSystem.Management.Automation.
Internal.Host.InteralHost.PushRunspace(Runspace runspace)
at Microsoft.Powershel.Commands.EnterPSSessionCommand.ProcessRecord()
at System.Management.Automation.Cmdlet.DoProcessRecord()
at System.Management.Automation.CommandProcessor.ProcessRecord()
end of inner exception stack trace
does it mean i have to write a custom PSHost and add support for the Enter-PSSession cmdlet with this parameter?
Is there any alternative to make this command work?
any help will be much appreciated.
Thanks,
Manish

Answer 1

The easiest way to open a remote session goes something like this:
string shell = "http://schemas.microsoft.com/powershell/Microsoft.PowerShell";
var target = new Uri("http://myserver/wsman");
var secured = new SecureString();
foreach (char letter in "mypassword")
{
secured.AppendChar(letter);
}
secured.MakeReadOnly();
var credential = new PSCredential("username", secured);
var connectionInfo = new WSManConnectionInfo(target, shell, credential);
Runspace remote = RunspaceFactory.CreateRunspace(connectionInfo);
remote.Open();
using (var ps = PowerShell.Create())
{
ps.Runspace = remote;
ps.Commands.AddCommand("'This is running on {0}.' -f (hostname)");
Collection<PSObject> output = ps.Invoke();
}
You could also create remote pipelines from the remote runspace instance, but the new PowerShell object is a much more managable way to do this (since powershell v2.)
In powershell v3, you can just new up a WSManConnectionInfo and set the ComputerName property as the other properties adopt the same defaults as the above. Unfortunately these properties are read-only in v2 and you have to pass in the minimum as above. Other variants of the constructor will let you use kerberos/negotiate/credssp etc for authentication.
-Oisin

Answer 2

I wanted to leave a comment on the solution, as it helped me alot as well,
but one thing i was missing was the port for WSMan which is 5985
so this
var target = new Uri("http://myserver/wsman");
should be
var target = new Uri("http://myserver:5895/wsman");
in my case

Answer 3

Have you tried Invoke-Command? Enter-PsSession is there for interactive use. (see help Enter-PsSession -online).