PowerShell for SQL Server Essentials

Scripting basics

Let's get a few syntax basics down. This section is not meant to be an exhaustive tutorial on PowerShell's syntax but should serve as a good, brief introduction.

Let's walk through the following script:

$currdate = (Get-Date -Format "yyyyMMdd hhmmtt")
$servers = @("ROGUE", "CEREBRO")

#save each server's running services into a file
$servers  |
ForEach-Object {

    $computername = $_
    Write-Host "`n`nProcessing $computername"

    $filename = "C:\Temp\$($computername) - $($currdate).csv"

    Get-Service -ComputerName $computername |
    Where-Object -Property Status -EQ "Running" |
    Select-Object Name, DisplayName |
    Export-Csv -Path $filename -NoTypeInformation

}

Even if you are not very familiar with PowerShell yet, you may already be able ...