Thread by @hillelogram

n² likes = n powershell tips

I guess I should tag this #powershell lol

1/ `?` is an alias for Where-Object and `%` is an alias for ForEach. So you can do `obj | ? filter | % block` to do things compactly.

`&` lets you invoke a string or script-block as a powershell command

2/ ctrl-space gives you a menu-completion for all options. This means you can write `obj.` and hit ctrl-space to get all its properties.

Alternatively, you can pipe the object to the `get-member` cmdlet

3/ You can really easily define your own tab-completion options with `Register-ArgumentCompleter`. It takes a script block, meaning you can do fun dymanic completions, AND ALSO you can use it on both builtin and user-defined commands!

docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershe…

4/ Powershell has "providers" which give you access to various windows objects like they were files. Want to find every environmental value that starts with `Local`? Easy, just do

gci Env:Local*

docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershe…

5/ Functions can have `begin`, `process`, and `end` subsections. When piped into, `begin` is run once, `process` on every item, and `end` afterwards. `Foreach` supports this, too:

> "a".."z" | % -Begin {$x = 0} -Process {$x++} -End {echo $x}
26

docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershe…

BTW, I don't really count this as a "powershell trick", but windows supports forward-slash paths too. You can write `C:/foo/bar` and it'll work just fine

6/

```
function Do-Thing([switch]$x) {
# ...
}

> Do-Thing # $ x is false in function body

> Do-Thing -x # $ x is true in function body
```

7/ You can create a detacted powershell session on your computer with

```
> Enable-PSRemoting # on an admin terminal

> $s = new-pssession -EnableNetworkAccess -name yournamehere -ComputerName localhost
```

docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershe…

You can also do `invoke-command -ScriptBlock {script} -InDisconnectedSession -ComputerName localhost -EnableNetworkAccess`

Unfortunately tho only one terminal can receive from a remote local session at a time which defeats my use case /sad

8/ Want inline completion prompts? Here ya go:

```
Install-Module -Name PSReadLine -AllowClobber -Force
Set-PSReadLineOption -PredictionSource History
```

9/ You can go back and forth in your location history with `cd -` and `cd +`. There's also a weird "multiple location stacks" feature I haven't played with yet

10/ Select-Object can take blocks to get custom properties. You can pass in blocks stored in variables:

```
$block = {$_.LastAccessTime -lt (Get-Date).AddHours(-2)}
gci -Recurse *.md | select Name, $block
```

10 (cont)/ If you want to get a nicer format, use a "calculated property" hash

$block = @{name="Modified over 2 hours ago?"; expr= {$_.LastAccessTime -lt (Get-Date).AddHours(-2)}}

docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershe…

11/ In addition to being able to start background processes with `command &`, you can use `Start-Job` to give names to jobs for easy receiving later. You can also assign jobs (and remote sessions) to variables!

12/ ctrl-space works on flags, too. You can write `gci -` and press ctrl-space to get all the possible parameters to `get-childitem`

13/ Sort-Object can take an array of blocks/properties, in which case it'll sort in that order

In retrospect I don't like that tip very much, so here's a better one:

13/ You reload your profile with `. $PROFILE`