Here is a clever trick to create cheat sheets for your favorite PowerShell commands.
Any PowerShell command ships via a module, so if you have a PowerShell command that is useful to you, you might want to list all the other (and possibly related) commands that ship in the same module. This line shows how to find the module name for any given command, and lists the module name that ships the Get-WmiObject cmdlet:
PS> PS> (Get-Command -Name Get-WmiObject).ModuleName Microsoft.PowerShell.Management
To find all other commands shipped by this module, try this:
PS> Get-Command -Module Microsoft.PowerShell.Management CommandType Name Version ----------- ---- ------- Cmdlet Add-Computer 3.1.0.0 Cmdlet Add-Content 3.1.0.0 Cmdlet Checkpoint-Computer 3.1.0.0 Cmdlet Clear-Content 3.1.0.0 Cmdlet Clear-EventLog 3.1.0.0 Cmdlet Clear-Item 3.1.0.0 Cmdlet Clear-ItemProperty 3.1.0.0 Cmdlet Clear-RecycleBin 3.1.0.0
To create a handy cheat sheet with command names and descriptions, pipe the command into Get-Help, and use Select-Object to pick the detail information from the help that you’d like to add to your cheat sheet:
PS> Get-Command -Module Microsoft.PowerShell.Management | Get-Help | Select-Object -Property Name, Synopsis Name Synopsis ---- -------- Add-Computer Add the local computer to a domain or workgroup. Add-Content Adds content to the specified items, such as adding word... Checkpoint-Computer Creates a system restore point on the local computer. Clear-Content Deletes the contents of an item, but does not delete the... Clear-EventLog Clears all entries from specified event logs on the loca... Clear-Item Clears the contents of an item, but does not delete the ... Clear-ItemProperty Clears the value of a property but does not delete the p... Clear-RecycleBin Complete-Transac... Commits the active transaction. Convert-Path Converts a path from a Windows PowerShell path to a Wind... Copy-Item Copies an item from one location to another. Copy-ItemProperty Copies a property and value from a specified location to... Debug-Process Debugs one or more processes running on the local computer. Disable-Computer... Disables the System Restore feature on the specified fil... Enable-ComputerR... Enables the System Restore feature on the specified file... Get-ChildItem Gets the items and child items in one or more specified ... Get-Clipboard Gets the current Windows clipboard entry. Get-ComputerInfo Gets a consolidated object of system and operating syste... Get-ComputerRest... Gets the restore points on the local computer. Get-Content Gets the content of the item at the specified location. Get-ControlPanel... Gets control panel items. Get-EventLog Gets the events in an event log, or a list of the event ... Get-HotFix Gets the hotfixes that have been applied to the local an... Get-Item Gets the item at the specified location. Get-ItemProperty Gets the properties of a specified item. Get-ItemProperty... Gets the value for one or more properties of a specified... Get-Location Gets information about the current working location or a...
If the help information is incomplete, and there is no synopsis information for the commands you chose, you might first have to download the PowerShell help. For that, you’d need a PowerShell with elevated privileges:
PS> Update-Help -UICulture en-us -Force
Don’t worry about error messages thrown by this command: it is normal for a few modules to not supply help information. If you get massive numbers of error messages, then you probably did not run the command with elevated privileges. Unfortunately, PowerShell stores its help files along with the modules in file locations that are not accessible to regular users.
