EXPLORING VARIOUS IT ENVIRONMENTS & INTRO TO

POWERSHELLPRESENTED FOR THE KENT STATE ASHTABULA AITP CHAPTER

NOVEMBER 13, 2013

SARAH DUTKIEWICZ

SARAH@CLETECHCONSULTING.COM

AGENDA

• Quick Background

• Adventures in IT

• What is IT

• IT in Education

• IT in an ISP

• IT in Manufacturing

• IT elsewhere

• Intro to PowerShell

• What is it

• Why you should care about it

• What products can benefit from it

• PowerShell Basics

• Resources

QUICK BACKGROUNDTHINGS TO KNOW BEFORE EMBARKING INTO IT ADVENTURES

SARAH’S BACKGROUND

• First computer was a Compaq Presario 486, late start into computing

• Originally focused on software – VB3 app talking to an Access database

• Data junkie / UX junkie

• Programming language junkie

• Programming and data internship right out of high school

• Bachelor of Science in Computer Science & Engineering Technology, University of Toledo, May 2002

• Various IT positions and a developer position along the way

• Independent consultant since August 2011

• Married to an IT consultant with similar background

COMPUTER SCIENCE & ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY

• Some electrical courses – resistive & reactive circuits, electronics, digital logic design, field programmable logic devices (VHDL)

• Some hardware-related courses – VLSI, PC and industrial networks, small computers

• Some programming-related courses – Microcomputers (Assembly), Web Site Design (HTML, XML) , Java, JavaScript, programming language paradigms

• Admin-related courses – Web server administration

• Middle-tier courses – Client-Server computing

ADVENTURES IN IT

WHAT IS I.T.?

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

The application of computers and telecommunications equipment to store,

retrieve, transmit and manipulate data, often in the context of business or other enterprise

SOME ROLES IN IT - ADMINISTRATORS

System administration

Software

Hardware

Server administration

Web server administration

Mail server administration

Database server administration

Network administration

OTHER ROLES IN IT

• Software developer

• Project manager

• Desktop or other client support

• Reports manager

• And many others

INDUSTRIES FOR IT CAREERS

• Manufacturing

• Medical

• Financial

• Energy

• Education

• Insurance

• Libraries

• Government

• Military

• Anywhere technology is needed! (EVERYWHERE!)

IT IN EDUCATION

TYPES OF CLIENTS

• Faculty and Staff

• Lawyers

• Military (ROTC)

• Executives (President, VPs, chancellors, etc.)

• Labs

ENVIRONMENT CONSIDERATIONS• Various platforms – Solaris, Linux, Windows, Mac; mobile, desktop, tablet

• Various backgrounds – technical and non-technical users

• Every client is different

• Sometimes you won’t know what you’re getting into until you’re there

STORIES FROM EDUCATION• The First Few Weeks

• The Paranoid Grad Student

• ROTC

• Overall Adventures

IT IN AN INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDER

(ISP)

WHAT MAKES UP THE IT TEAM OF AN ISP• Systems Administrators

• Mail Administrators

• Webserver Administrators

• Network Administrators & Engineers

• Web Developers*

• Technical Support

EXPERIENCE WITH TECH SUPPORT• First line of defense, sometimes the gateway to the other tech departments

• Mostly phone support, some onsite support

• Not scripted, as every call is different

• End user could be a personal or business account

• Customers are human, so add a personal touch

• Pay attention to others on the team and learn from them

• Don’t be afraid to talk to other departments to learn about their jobs so that you can do your job better in supporting them as well, since calls may come in for them

STORIES FROM ISP I.T.• The “I Want to Talk to the Manager” Dilemma

• Becoming Familiar with Clients

IT IN MANUFACTURING

MOTTO OF MANUFACTURING

If it’s broken, fix it. If it’s working, don’t break it.

ROLES OF IT IN MANUFACTURING

• Database Administrator

• ERP systems

• Timeclocks

• Financial reporting

• HR issues

• System Administrator

• Network Administrator

• Troubleshoot technical issues with machines

• Phone system (PBX) administration

• Desktop support

STORIES FROM IT IN MANUFACTURING

• Sensitive Data

• Security Checks

• Small Team to Large Client Base

IT ELSEWHERE

GENERAL NOTES ON IT • IT roles may be siloed – where you can specialize in a part of IT and stay with it

• Smaller companies try for more jacks of all trades to watch their IT costs

• A lot of companies see IT as nothing more than an overhead department, despite the necessity

• Consultants are jacks of all trades

• Managers of IT departments may or may not have technical experience; some places put managers in place with business/team building skills rather than technical know-how

INTRO TO POWERSHELL

AGENDA• What is it

• Why you should care about it

• What products can benefit from it

• System requirements

• Resources

WHAT IS POWERSHELL?• .NET Scripting Language from Microsoft used for task automation

and configuration management

• Available for Windows XP and later

• Comes with newer Windows operating systems

• Can be used to replace batch files and VBScript files

• Extensible automation engine

WHO CAN BENEFIT FROM POWERSHELL?• Developers

• System Administrators

• Mail Administrators

• Database Administrators

• SharePoint Administrators

• Anyone who has tasks using the .NET Framework that can be automated

SIMPLE POWERSHELL EXAMPLE

OBJECT-ORIENTED NATURE OF POWERSHELL

WHY YOU SHOULD CARE ABOUT POWERSHELL• Managing one user in a GUI = easy; managing hundreds of users in a GUI = time-consuming

• Many click-click-click processes can be automated

• Automating processes with a script makes processing quicker, giving you more time to tackle other issues or projects

• VBScript is a thing of the past; a lot more products are using PowerShell for administration

WHAT CAN IT AUTOMATE?• List all computers on a network, with their operating system and service pack level

• Start a service on multiple computers

• Manage Active Directory users

• Scrape all the event logs on your network for a particular error

• IIS website setup

• And many more!

PRODUCTS THAT BENEFIT FROM POWERSHELL ADMINISTRATION• Active Directory

• Exchange

• Office 365

• SharePoint

• SQL Server

• Windows Server

• IIS

• Network Administration

• VPN

• BitLocker

• IBM Websphere MQ

• System Center

• Windows Compute Cluster Server

• VMWare vShere

TWO ENVIRONMENTS• Console

• Integrated Scripting Environment

SOME OF THE SUPPORTED OPERATING SYSTEMS• Windows Server 2012

• Windows 8

• Windows Server 2008 R2

• Windows Server 2008 R2 Server Core

• Windows Server 2008 SP1 – SP3

• Windows 7

• Windows Vista SP1 – SP2

• Windows XP SP3 & Windows 7 XP Mode

• Windows Embedded POSReady 2009

• Windows Embedded for Point of Service 1.1

MINIMUM INSTALLATION REQUIREMENTS

• Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 with Service Pack 1

• Windows Management Framework Core

COMPONENTS

• Variables• Aliases• Cmdlets• Functions• Providers• Modules

VARIABLES• Store results in a variable to use later

• Some variables are built-in

• Special variables

• args – collection of arguments passed to a script

• $_ - the pipeline variable

• $Host – information about the current PowerShell environment

• ~ - user’s home directory

• List current variables:

dir Variable:\

ALIASES• Shortcuts for commands

• Set-Alias for setting aliases

• Get-Alias for getting aliases

• No alias alias:

Set-Alias alias Set-Alias

CMDLETS

• Pronounced “command-let”

• Verb-Noun Structure

• Most Helpful Ones When Learning;

• Get-Help / Update-Help

• Get-Command

• Get-Member

• Specific Approved Verbs – see Get-Verb

GET-HELP / UPDATE-HELP• Newer versions of PowerShell aren’t shipping with the help files so Update-Help should be run first

• At any point, you can type Get-Help for help

• Syntax:

Get-Help topic –type

Get-Help cmdlet – type

• Topics typically start with about_

• Types of help include:

• Examples

• Detailed

• Full

• Online

GET-HELP EXAMPLES

GET-COMMAND• Gets a list of available commands

• Can do wildcard searches

• Can filter results with options – including Verb, Module, Noun, CommandType

GET-COMMAND EXAMPLE

GET-MEMBER• Shows attributes, properties, and methods of an object

• Shows the .NET type of an object

• Syntax:

Object | Get-Member

• Object can be a command, cmdlet, variable, or other .NET object

GET-MEMBER EXAMPLES

PROVIDERS• Make it easier to access certain data stores

• Includes :

• Registry

• Certificates

• Environment Variables

• FileSystem

• Function

• Alias

• Variable

• WSMAN

MODULES• Package of goodies

• Cmdlets

• Aliases

• Functions

• Providers

• Other PowerShell Goodies

SCRIPT MODULE• Written in PowerShell

• PSM1 file

BINARY MODULE• Written in C#

• DLL file

MANIFEST MODULE• PSD1 File

• New-ModuleManifest

POWERSHELL RESOURCES

• Hey Scripting Guy! Blog: http://blogs.technet.com/b/heyscriptingguy/

• PowerScripting Podcast: http://powerscripting.wordpress.com/

• Automating Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Administration with Windows PowerShell 2.0: http://qtlil.me/psbook

• PowerShell.org: http://powershell.org

• PowerShell.com

• On Twitter: #PowerShell

SARAH DUTKIEWICZ

TWITTER: @SADUKIE

BLOG: HTTP://CODINGGEEKETTE.COM

EMAIL: SARAH@CLETECHCONSULTING.COM

LINKEDIN: MY LINKEDIN PROFILE