PowerShell: Scripting & Automation Fundamentals

Ground yourself in PowerShell basics by learning syntax, cmdlet formats, variables, and reading user input within the prepared environment to write and run code.

Set up PowerShell 7 with Visual Studio Code, create a Hello World PS1, verify the PS version, and run from the command prompt to see blue output via -ForegroundColor.

Master PowerShell variables: naming with a leading dollar sign, descriptive camel case, and types like string, int, float, boolean, and object. Learn assignment, expansion, on-the-fly creation, and read-host input.

Explore aliases in PowerShell to create command shortcuts and maintain backwards compatibility, learn how dir maps to Get-ChildItem, and manage, define, and remove custom aliases.

Master PowerShell basics: syntax, verb-noun naming like write-host, descriptive variables with a dollar sign, and common cmdlets such as get service, import CSV, and get content, plus help and aliases.

Explore how PowerShell treats everything as objects and uses the pipeline to pass data between stages, with basics on properties, methods, filtering, sorting, and comparing object sets.

Explore PowerShell objects, their properties and methods, and the pipeline that passes objects between commands. Learn using get-member, measure, and import-csv with sample data.

Master format-list and format-table in PowerShell to view object data, select properties with dash property, and switch between pipeline input and input object for tabular outputs.

Explore how the Where-Object cmdlet filters objects in the pipeline through boolean expressions and comparisons, with aliases and practical Get-Process examples.

Apply a script block to each object in the pipeline using for each object, with the percent sign alias, to filter processes and kill Microsoft Edge instances.

Explore escaping in PowerShell, using the backtick to embed characters in double quoted strings and prevent expansion. Learn how to escape dollars, quotes, new line, tabs, and Unicode.

Explore PowerShell string indexing and slicing, including zero-based access and ranges like 2..4, and reversing with join. Learn string immutability, the string-vs-array distinction, and length and index concepts.

Explore how plus and asterisk operators manipulate strings in PowerShell, enabling concatenation, repetition, and formatting with indented dashes.

Learn how here-strings enable multi-line text blocks in PowerShell, supporting XML, JSON, and HTML, and understand how single and double quotes influence expansion and open/close syntax.

Master PowerShell format strings by using templates and index-based placeholders with codes for decimals, currency, hex, binary, and date time formatting.

Master the basics of regular expressions to perform pattern matching and value extraction in PowerShell and beyond. Learn core codes like digits, spaces, word characters, and anchors.

Explore regular expressions and match groups in PowerShell, using the matches variable to access group zero and named groups like first, middle, and last names; learn phone number patterns.

Explore basic mathematics and order of precedence in PowerShell, master arithmetic operations, shortcuts like ++ and +=, and a range of math methods from pi to trigonometric functions.

Explore static math methods in PowerShell's math class, including log, power, sqrt, trig, floor, ceiling, min, max, and magic numbers pi, e, and tau.

Explore boolean logic in PowerShell, distinguishing true and false, truthy and falsy, and how comparisons shape conditionals, loops, and short-circuiting with the bool type ($true, $false).

Summarizes how PowerShell evaluates true and false, truthy and falsy, uses Boolean logic and comparisons with parentheses, and relies on short-circuiting to minimize work.

Explore bitwise logic in modern PowerShell mastery, learning how to use masks and bit shifts to combine flags at the binary level.

Explore bitwise operations at the bit level, including and, or, xor, and not, with examples using nibbles and bytes to demonstrate per-bit results and casting.

Learn how bit shifting works in modern PowerShell Mastery, shifting bits left or right with zero fill, illustrated by binary examples and code that show bits falling off.

Conclude with bitwise operations, examining binary-level handling, including and, xor, left and right shifts, and show how binary logic—true and false—underpins computers, math, and programming.

Explore code blocks and conditionals, mastering how to use if, else if, switch, and the ternary operator with truthy and falsy logic.

Explore code blocks, or script blocks, in PowerShell and their curly braces syntax. Use them in conditionals, loops, functions, and pipelines.

Explore PowerShell conditionals with the if statement, using boolean expressions, parentheses, and curly braces. Build robust logic with else and else if chains so only the first true condition runs.

Learn the PowerShell seven ternary operator, a concise three-value conditional with a condition, a value if true, and a value if false; see simple code examples.

Explore the null coalescing operator in PowerShell seven, using the two question marks to return left values or defaults, and the ??= shortcut for safe defaults.

Master arrays in PowerShell by adding elements with plus equals, which creates a new array and leaves the original unchanged; test inclusion with contains or in, and slicing and reversing.

Learn how hash tables in PowerShell store unique, case-insensitive keys to values, declared with @{} and accessed via [key], with operations like contains and remove and inspecting keys and values.

Learn how PSCustomObject, a type accelerator in PowerShell, casts a hash table into a usable object. Access properties like make, model, and year, and use get-member and select.

Explore variables and type casting in this short module, examining string and number types, how casting works, and strategies for safe conversions to prevent common programming errors.

Explore type casting in PowerShell by performing explicit casts, using the as operator for safe conversions that yield null when they fail, and relying on implicit casting in context.

Master variable types in PowerShell by inspecting types, understanding casting, and avoiding casting errors to ensure reliable results in your PowerShell scripts.