Getting Primed on Powershell

0:00Welcome to the content on getting up to speed on PowerShell and welcome to the

0:05AZ-140 certification exam focusing in on virtual desktop infrastructure. Now

0:11you

0:12may be stopping and thinking yourself you may have actually spied on this

0:16playlist and the content that's coming up and you see that immediately out of

0:20the gate we're talking about PowerShell we're gonna talk about Azure CLI we're

0:25gonna talk about ARM templates with JSON and bicep and none of that has

0:29anything to do with virtual desktop infrastructure or does it the AZ-140

0:35certification exam specifically has a bullet point on deploying virtual desktop

0:40infrastructure with PowerShell with the AZ CLI with JSON ARM templates and with

0:47bicep ARM templates and if you are not familiar with working with those types

0:52of things up front you're gonna have a bad time when it comes to taking the

0:57certification exam I personally have not taken a Microsoft exam yet that doesn

1:02't

1:02have PowerShell on it but beyond that even if we take the certification exam

1:07out of the picture for a second I personally feel the PowerShell is one of

1:12the most powerful and important things that any Microsoft developer or

1:18Microsoft

1:19systems administrator cloud architect network engineer everyone should know

1:24fundamental PowerShell it is extremely powerful hopefully by the end of this

1:29set of videos you will feel the exact same way what we're going to do is we're

1:32going to introduce the fundamentals of PowerShell ultimately the thing that I

1:37want you to take away from this is to be able to look at a PowerShell script

1:42that you've never seen before and be able to tell exactly what's happening in

1:46it

1:47if you can do that you are set up for much better success when it comes time to

1:52take your certification exam so without further ado let's get primed on

1:56PowerShell let's go

0:00There's a few things going into this content that you might be thinking to

0:04yourself.

0:04You might be thinking to yourself, "Hey, yourself, I don't think I really need

0:08to learn PowerShell

0:10because it's something that I haven't used yet in my career.

0:14I've been fine on just the standard command line or I've been doing fine on

0:19just the

0:20GUI.

0:21I'm going to tell you you're missing out because PowerShell really is a

0:26powerful shell.

0:27PowerShell is in fact an object oriented programming language.

0:34And with that comes a lot of well flexibility and power that you can use with

0:40it.

0:41Then you also might be thinking to yourself, "Well, why do you have on the

0:44screen these

0:45documents on how to install PowerShell?

0:48Don't I already have PowerShell out of the box if I buy, say, a Windows

0:53computer?"

0:54Sort of.

0:55Now Windows computers, PowerShell out of the box, ships with something known as

1:00Windows

1:01PowerShell.

1:02And that is a little bit different from what we now know and work with, which

1:06is the open

1:08source version of PowerShell, known as PowerShell version 7.

1:14Sometimes you see PowerShell abbreviated PWSH, which is why I'm writing it on

1:19the screen.

1:19In fact, that's actually a command that you have to type on some operating

1:23systems to

1:24launch PowerShell.

1:25See, you're already learning something.

1:28PowerShell version 7 again does not ship with any operating system out of the

1:32box.

1:32And this is why it's really important to talk about PowerShell 7.

1:36It's not just that it's the latest and greatest.

1:39It's that what we're here primarily to talk about is Azure.

1:44We're going to be working with Azure Virtual Desktop Infrastructure.

1:48And the exam blueprint calls for using PowerShell to deploy pieces of Virtual

1:53Desktop

1:53Infrastructure.

1:54Well, when it comes to typing PowerShell commands to work directly with Azure,

2:00that is only currently

2:02supported by PowerShell version 7.

2:05So if you have any intention of working with Azure via PowerShell, you must, I

2:10repeat, must

2:11have PowerShell version 7, which requires you to go out and get it.

2:15Now there's a few different ways that you can go out and get it.

2:18I'm going to show you some of the easier ways and some of the more complicated

2:21ways.

2:22In my opinion, one of the easiest ways to go out and get it is to go straight

2:26to the

2:26source of PowerShell.

2:28It is github.com/powershell/powershell.

2:33So if I just click on it right here, this is where it takes github.com/power

2:37shell/powershell.

2:38This is proving yet again that this is open source.

2:42Anyone who has to know how or will power can continue to help work with

2:49PowerShell.

2:50It is open source in the sense that anyone can fork this repository and make

2:54changes

2:55or fixes or new feature updates to it and propose that Microsoft add those in

3:00to a new

3:00release or build.

3:03Now when you're ready just to come along and download it over here on the right

3:05hand

3:06side of the screen, you can see the releases section where my mouse is

3:10currently.

3:11Go ahead and click releases and it takes you in.

3:13The latest release is up here on top.

3:17Currently it's 7.4.0.

3:19You can see this was released two weeks ago.

3:21And when you want to download and install it, you can scroll on down right here

3:26to the assets

3:27section.

3:28Now do note there are 25 total assets.

3:31That's not what you see right here on the screen.

3:33To see them all, you click show all 25 assets.

3:36Now you can see the down the installers that you need for your particular

3:41environment.

3:42So you could use Mac OS with ARM based architecture or Intel based architecture

3:48, Windows for 64

3:49bit or 32 bit.

3:52And then of course Linux based installations again also based on Intel

3:55architecture or

3:56ARM based architecture.

3:58Now some of these might be a little tricky.

4:00You might not be on an operating system where you can navigate to a red browser

4:04downloaded

4:05and install it.

4:06You might be on something like Ubuntu server or Windows subsystem for Linux.

4:10Check this out.

4:11This is why I did bring up that documentation at the end of the day to go out

4:14and get Windows

4:15PowerShell or it was so I said Windows PowerShell PowerShell PowerShell version

4:18seven.

4:20Open up the document that is relevant to you.

4:23I'll bring up PowerShell on Windows Mac OS and Ubuntu.

4:27Those are going to be the three most popular ones.

4:29And each of them does have a unique way of going out and getting them.

4:33The recommended method if you're on Windows is to use when get.

4:37Fire up your command line and do when get search Microsoft dot PowerShell.

4:42You'll see both the standard support as well as the preview version of

4:47PowerShell.

4:48And then you just choose which one you want to install by typing in the command

4:52with the

4:53given ID that you see above right there.

4:55Now of course like I said above you do have the ability to download the

4:58packages themselves

5:00like the MSI's.

5:01That's a nice and easy way to do it.

5:03So if you don't want to use the package manager for whatever reason you could

5:06just do the installer

5:07that way.

5:08Again if you're working with something like Windows Server Core where you're

5:12not going

5:13to have a GUI to go install the packages or download from a browser you can use

5:17when

5:18get to go get it.

5:19Mac OS again a pretty straightforward installation.

5:22You can just use brew.

5:24The only catch of course is that you do have to add the repository to the brew

5:30environment.

5:31If you don't have brew already that's what this command is showing you how to

5:35go out

5:36and do.

5:37And then using the brew command you can again once more install it.

5:40Now like I said above or before you can then type P W S H to launch PowerShell.

5:46So as you could probably tell from right now I am currently working on a Mac OS

5:52machine.

5:52This is actually using a M2 MacBook Pro so it is Apple Silicon.

5:57If I type P W S H boom you can see I bring up the PowerShell prompt and it's

6:01denoted right

6:02there with that PS.

6:04I'll go ahead and close it.

6:06It will warn you that you're terminating the PowerShell process that's

6:10perfectly fine.

6:11Also notice that it's very easy to update and upgrade your version of

6:15PowerShell using

6:15brew with just a couple simple commands.

6:18Lastly on Ubuntu let's scroll down and take a look at how to use this.

6:23Not terribly surprising we're going to be using the app repositories right here

6:27making

6:27sure that we have the prerequisites to install.

6:30So we get the prerequisite packages.

6:32We then get the repository keys and register the repository.

6:37Then it's just as simple as a pseudo app install PowerShell.

6:41And again using the P W S H command launches PowerShell.

6:46Now also the exam blueprint calls for us to work with another type of shell

6:51that you

6:52might be familiar with if you've ever worked with Azure before.

6:55And that is the Azure CLI.

6:57Let's go ahead and search for the Azure CLI and make while we're talking about

7:01installing

7:01shells into our environment make sure you get PowerShell version seven then

7:06make sure

7:06you get the Azure CLI as well.

7:08So let's go ahead and take a look at this.

7:10Bringing up this documentation feel free to click one of the links above to

7:14bring it here.

7:15You've got the same drill here.

7:16This is again, open source so it works with Windows, Mac OS or Linux and

7:23importantly both

7:25the Azure CLI and PowerShell are built on top of the dot net framework.

7:31Now you might be thinking yourself what's really the difference between the

7:34Azure CLI

7:35and PowerShell.

7:36Well, the Azure CLI is a true CLI where you are issuing commands telling it to

7:42do something.

7:44PowerShell is more object oriented programming.

7:48And I know this concept between the difference of just a true shell or command

7:53line interface

7:54versus an object oriented programming language might feel a little fuzzy.

7:58But by the end of this set of videos, when we get to the end of it, this will

8:01make a

8:02whole lot more sense.

8:04The ultimate thing that I really want you to know is why you would use either

8:09of these.

8:10But before I get into that, let's make sure that we actually get these

8:14installed again.

8:14Choose the operating system of your choice.

8:17Windows, Mac OS or Linux, all open source, all built on the dot net framework,

8:21which

8:21is now open source.

8:23And you can choose your installer again.

8:25You can download it via right here by clicking these buttons.

8:29You can also download it by using PowerShell.

8:33So again, if you're working on something like a Windows Server core environment

8:36, you

8:37can actually download the Azure CLI via this PowerShell command right here.

8:41There's also the Windows package manager, which again is using WinGet.

8:45Easy peasy over on the Mac OS side of things.

8:48Guess what?

8:49We're just using brew one more time with brew install Azure CLI.

8:53Only thing I'll tell you right here is do notice that it's going to install

8:56Python version

8:573.10, which is, you know, one of the later versions of Python.

9:00I think the current version is 3.11 or 3.12.

9:03But nonetheless, this is going to bump it up to 3.10 to actually download and

9:08install

9:08the Azure CLI.

9:09And of course Ubuntu is going to look very similar to something that you just

9:14saw in

9:14the previous set, installing our prerequisites, installing the Microsoft

9:18signing key, updating

9:20the repository, and then installing the Azure CLI.

9:24Okay.

9:25So why, why do we care about this again?

9:28Why are we having to learn about PowerShell and why are we having to learn

9:32about?

9:33The Azure CLI.

9:34This is a much bigger fundamental topic.

9:38Ultimately, here I'm just going to bring up my terminal on the screen so that I

9:41have

9:41a little bit of writing space.

9:43Doing things from the GUI or the Azure portal, they're great for when you're

9:50first getting

9:51started or you have like a one off task that you need to implement very quickly

9:55.

9:55Hey, I need to spin up a virtual machine.

9:58Just one virtual machine.

9:59Do this one thing really quick.

10:00I'm just going to jump in the portal and spin up a virtual machine.

10:03No big deal, but if I have to do a lot of the same task over and over and over

10:09and over

10:10again and it's very repetitive and importantly that it's critical that it gets

10:15done right,

10:16doing the same thing over and over and over again can lead to human error.

10:23This differs quite a bit from if I were to create something like a PowerShell

10:27script or

10:28something like a shell script.

10:30I could create it in such a way that I only have to create this script one time

10:35, test it

10:36out and make sure it works well, and then I can rerun the script to do the task

10:40whenever

10:41I need to.

10:43This significantly reduces human error.

10:46It also significantly increases the time to deployment.

10:51Let's imagine that I had to spin up 1000 virtual desktops in Azure.

10:57If I had to do that manually, it would be an absolute pain.

11:00It would take me forever and I'd probably blow something up, you know, halfway

11:03through

11:04it.

11:05Whereas if I just created a script one time and then told it, you know, run

11:09until I have

11:10a thousand virtual machines, well, guess what?

11:14That's a massive win.

11:16Beyond that, these files, these PowerShell files or these shell files, at the

11:20end of the

11:20day, they are as simple as text files and text files can be used with version

11:26control.

11:27Also known as source control.

11:30The big win here is as these files change, as they iterate, as we improve upon

11:36them or

11:36change them, or alter them slightly, I now have a lot of control over tracking

11:41each of

11:42these changes historically.

11:44I can see what changed from one version to the next and I can always revert

11:48back to

11:48an older version if I need to.

11:50Ultimately, when we start talking about PowerShell, the Azure CLI, ARM

11:58templates, which come in

12:00the form of JSON or Bicep, what we're really talking about here is the big A

12:06word.

12:07No, I'm not saying what you think I'm saying.

12:08I'm saying automation.

12:11This is about streamlining repetitive tasks and ensuring that they're not error

12:17prone.

12:18So this is the why, this is ultimately why we're here to get started working

12:22with PowerShell.

12:23Now, there's one last thing I really want you to go out and install before we

12:28begin.

12:28And that is Visual Studio Code or VS Code.

12:31That is code.visualstudio.com.

12:34You can see when you come to this page right here, you can click the drop down

12:37and you can

12:38choose again which operating system you want to work with, Mac OS, Windows or

12:43Linux.

12:44Go ahead and take a moment right now to download and install this.

12:48Use the stable version.

12:49That's all you need for right now.

12:50Pause the video and come back to it once it's installed.

12:53Great.

12:54You got Visual Studio installed.

12:56I'm very happy that you did.

12:58Now what we need to do is we need to make sure that it's ready to work with

13:02things like

13:02PowerShell as well as ARM templates.

13:05Now, over here on the right hand side of the screen, you see all of my icons

13:09that I have

13:10right here.

13:11First by default might actually be on the left hand side of the screen.

13:14I just prefer for mine to be on the right hand side.

13:17So I toggle my preferences a little bit to push it over here on the right hand

13:21side.

13:22But don't freak out if yours is on the left hand side.

13:24It's totally norm.

13:25What I want you to look for is I want you to look for the little icon that

13:27looks like

13:28these blocks right here.

13:30Give the blocks a click.

13:32This is called extensions.

13:33And one of the cool things about VS Code is that out of the box, it doesn't do

13:36everything

13:37under the sun that you need it to do, but you can add plugins to it like

13:41extensions

13:42to help you get started.

13:43What I want you to search for first is PowerShell.

13:47And this is adding support for the PowerShell programming language into VS Code

13:51.

13:51You'll see it right here on top.

13:53It's created by Microsoft and you'll see an install button right around here

13:57where I'm

13:57circling.

13:58Give that install button a click and you'll be off to the races ready for

14:02PowerShell.

14:03Now what I want you to search for is Bicep and right here you see Bicep

14:08language support

14:09for Visual Studio Code again created by Microsoft.

14:13Give that install button a click and you're off to the races with Bicep ARM

14:17templates.

14:18Now what I want you to search for is Azure resource.

14:22Give that a click and this is what I want you to search for next.

14:25The first thing I want you to install is the second one that I've got it

14:28highlighted

14:29on the list here.

14:31Azure resources again created by Microsoft give the install button right around

14:35here

14:36a click and let that get done.

14:38And once that's done then install Azure resource manager tools arm tools and

14:44let that install.

14:46Once you have these extensions installed that is PowerShell that is Bicep that

14:52is Azure resources

14:54and Azure resource manager arm tools your environment is ready to rock and roll

14:59.

14:59As far as learning how to work with PowerShell and how to work with ARM

15:05templates.

15:06So in the next video that's exactly what we're going to do.

15:09We're going to get started using it.

15:10I hope this has been informative for you and I'd like to thank you for viewing.

0:00So here's what I want you to do on whatever computer that you're working with.

0:03I want you to make a directory, a folder on your computer right now called PWSH

0:08demo.

0:09Something as simple as that.

0:11Here's why I want you to do that.

0:12With that folder created, what we're going to do is we're going to make that

0:16our workspace

0:17in VS Code.

0:18Then right click over here and choose, you know, in this empty space.

0:21You can see right here I've got the Explorer as my section.

0:25And over here in this empty space, anywhere in your empty space, choose Add a

0:28folder to

0:29your workspace.

0:31Find your folder.

0:32In my case, there it is, PWSH demo.

0:34It's empty.

0:35And I'll click Add to bring it into the workspace.

0:38Now I promise me to you trust the authors of the files in this folder.

0:41Well, I am the authors of the file in this folder.

0:43So I'll say yes, I trust it.

0:45So I see PWSH demo is right here on the screen.

0:49And within PWSH demo, with it highlighted right here, I can right click and

0:54choose New

0:55File.

0:56Let's call this file get started dot ps1.

1:01Ps1 is the PowerShell extension.

1:05Now if you see this select a workspace folder to use for the PowerShell

1:08extension, choose

1:10your PowerShell demo folder that you have.

1:14When that comes up, what you'll see is down here on the bottom, it actually

1:17launches a

1:18PowerShell terminal directly in VS Code for you.

1:24So up here in the editing section, this is where you're going to type your

1:27PowerShell

1:28script.

1:29And down here in the terminal is where you'll actually test it out.

1:33So let's get started talking about how PowerShell commands are structured.

1:38The first thing you should know is they're not even called commands.

1:41They're called command let's CMD L E T.

1:47A command let is always formed in the exact same structure.

1:53That is verb hyphen noun.

1:59You can almost think about it as do hyphen something.

2:05Now here's the real kicker.

2:06You've heard me say this a few times that this is an object oriented

2:12programming language.

2:14And what we're going to do is we're going to start off with a very simple

2:18theory right

2:18here.

2:19The verb noun do something is usually telling it to do some operation with an

2:27object.

2:27Perhaps the object that I want to work with is a virtual machine.

2:34Maybe that virtual machine is an Azure.

2:36The way one of these commandlets would look would be something like set hyphen

2:44AZVM.

2:46Now thankfully because I installed the PowerShell extension, my PowerShell

2:51environment is trying

2:53to show me a lot of different options that I could use here.

2:56yours might need a little help to get it there just yet.

2:59Remember how VS code had extensions because out of the box VS code couldn't do

3:04everything

3:05that you wanted it to do.

3:07Well PowerShell is actually the same way.

3:10PowerShell out of the box doesn't have the ability even PowerShell version

3:15seven doesn't

3:16have the ability to work with Azure.

3:19What we have to do is we have to install the Azure commandlets into our

3:23PowerShell version

3:24seven environment.

3:25So with our newfound knowledge of what extensions are for VS code and what that

3:29kind of looks

3:30like for PowerShell plus the fact that commandlets are verb hyphen noun command

3:36lets.

3:36Here's what I really want you to do.

3:38I want you to type install hyphen module and then the name AZ right there.

3:49Hopefully this is starting to set up the basic syntax and drill home what it is

3:52that we're

3:53trying to do.

3:54Here's our verb.

3:55We're installing our noun a module that is basically what an extension for

4:01PowerShell

4:01is called.

4:02It's called a module and then we have to tell it which module right here called

4:05AZ.

4:06We're going to talk a little bit more about that in the next video though.

4:10Just trying to drill home how you can work with VS code and what the structure

4:14of a

4:14basic commandlet looks like.

4:16So with this being said, I'm going to go to file save.

4:21So this file is now saved and now watch this.

4:23I'm going to go to run and then start debugging right there with the F5 is

4:27another way to

4:28put it.

4:29So when I press run right here, we see down here in the terminal, it starts to

4:34run.

4:34Now it's prompted me.

4:35Are you sure you want to install this module from an untrusted thing?

4:39I'm going to say a to accept yes to all in the terminal and then press enter

4:45and boom.

4:45Now it tells me I've already got mine installed.

4:48That's great.

4:49Yours is going to take a minute or two to actually go through the installation

4:52process

4:53because all of the Azure commandlets, every single thing that you can do in

4:58Azure is all

4:58available via a PowerShell command.

5:01So it's going to go out and get all of the commandlets for all of Azure and

5:04that may

5:05take a minute or two.

5:07So once it gets done with the installation for you, now you should be able to

5:11see things

5:12like new AZ VM.

5:14What does new AZ VM do?

5:16Well, I just want you to take a moment to pause and think about what new AZ VM

5:20might do.

5:23Do do do do do do do do.

5:24It creates a new Azure virtual machine.

5:27And right here, right now at this moment, this is where I want to end this

5:31video.

5:32You already did a lot in this video.

5:34You now understand the structure of a PowerShell command.

5:38It is verb hyphen now.

5:39Do hyphen something new hyphen something.

5:43Get hyphen something.

5:45Get hyphen something.

5:47Delete hyphen something.

5:49Update hyphen something.

5:51Install hyphen something.

5:54Beyond that, you learned how to create a PowerShell script and run a script in

5:59envious

6:00code.

6:01Give yourself a pat on the back because you've already come a really long way

6:04in a short

6:04amount of time.

6:06Now in the next video, we're going to take our understanding of PowerShell

6:10commandlets

6:11up a lot when we start talking about parameters.

6:14I hope this has been informative for you and I'd like to thank you for viewing.

0:00Okay, so now we're going to zoom in a little bit and focus in on what it is

0:03that we're

0:04really trying to do here.

0:06We got commandlets down.

0:07Remember we did install module from above, and then we gave it a name like AZ.

0:13That was actually the name of all of the Azure commandlets.

0:16That's the name of the module.

0:17It's called AZ.

0:18And that's actually why every Azure commandlet has an AZ in it.

0:24You'll have your verb, you know, do hyphen something, right?

0:27Do, then you'll have hyphen AZ, then some object.

0:32That's how you know it's an Azure commandlet.

0:34So remember new hyphen AZ VM.

0:38That's how I knew that this was going to create a new Azure virtual machine.

0:43Now let me show you how we can start using this knowledge and building upon it.

0:48You see, when we were talking about being an object oriented programming

0:51language, we

0:52were saying things like, I want to perform some action, like get the details of

0:57an

0:57Azure virtual machine.

0:58I want to know if, you know, what size it is, or, you know, is it currently

1:03running?

1:04Really any detail related to this virtual machine is something that I need to

1:08be aware

1:09of.

1:10But by itself, get AZ VM doesn't really get the job done, does it?

1:15That doesn't tell you which virtual machine we want to get.

1:18And this is where we start to talk about the next concept.

1:20And that's parameters.

1:23Some parameters are required in order to run particular PowerShell command

1:28links, like

1:29get AZ VM.

1:30Some parameters are not.

1:32They just give us additional flexibility or ways that we can run or basically

1:36filter

1:37out data that could be coming back.

1:40Ultimately, when I'm trying to get an Azure virtual machine, I'm trying to get

1:44the details

1:45about a single Azure virtual machine.

1:48So what we need to do is we need to tell this commandlet, we have some

1:51additional parameters

1:52for you to run.

1:54So check this out from my terminal or excuse me, from my VS code environment

1:58right here,

1:58I'm going to type a hyphen and immediately what pops up is all of the different

2:03parameters

2:04that I could run.

2:06The first parameter I see is resource group name.

2:09Now at this point in your Azure journey, there's a little bit of an expectation

2:13.

2:13If you're going for the AZ 140, that you're familiar with the basics of Azure,

2:17like what

2:17resource groups are.

2:19I happen to have a resource group and a virtual machine already running my

2:23resource group

2:24name, which I'll type in right here, then needs to be followed by the actual

2:29name of

2:29the resource group.

2:30In my case, I can type AZ hyphen 140 hyphen demo.

2:36That's the name of my resource group.

2:38Then what I need to find is my virtual machine.

2:41So I'll type a hyphen again, and then I'll specify the name of my virtual

2:46machine.

2:47In this case, the name of my virtual machine is P W S H demo.

2:51That's the name of my virtual machine.

2:54Now this is the minimum this needed to actually run this command line.

2:58These are the two required things because at this point, you would know, okay,

3:02go look

3:02in this resource group for a virtual machine with this name.

3:06There shouldn't be any duplicates in there.

3:08So it should be able to return the details back to me.

3:10Now, don't worry about running this command yet.

3:13You're not there.

3:14I just want you to see that it works.

3:16I'm going to do a run start debugging.

3:18It's going to run the script down below and boom, look at this.

3:22See, here's all the details of my virtual machine.

3:24I can see its location.

3:26I can see the name.

3:27I can see its ID.

3:28I can see what subscription it belongs to.

3:31I can see which availability zone it's in.

3:33I can see that it is succeeded in provisioning.

3:36And then inside of that are a lot of different things here called sub objects

3:40that we're

3:41not quite ready to talk about yet, but we will be soon.

3:44The point is, is that I wanted you to see, first of all, it's not just enough

3:48to usually

3:49have a commandlet.

3:50We usually have to give the commandlet additional information on how to run by

3:55giving it parameters.

3:56Now, the real question for you becomes, how do you know which parameters or

4:01even which

4:01commandlet you want to run in the first place?

4:04What I'm going to do is I'm going to collapse my little browse window over here

4:08to give

4:08me, give myself a little more space to work with on the terminal and I'll zoom

4:12in just

4:12a little bit more so the font is pretty big.

4:15Now I'm going to work on the terminal for just a second and I want you to see

4:18how this

4:19works.

4:20One of the most powerful commandlets that you can use is actually get help.

4:26So if I want to use get help and then I can tell you what what commandlet do I

4:30want help

4:30with like get AZVM, I can press enter and now it tells me details about the

4:37actual commandlet

4:38itself.

4:39First of all, I see the name of the commandlet.

4:42I see a quick synopsis like a description gets the properties of a virtual

4:46machine and

4:46then I see get AZVM can run with a bunch of different parameters.

4:53Now this is the part that needs a little help for me to explain what it is that

4:58it does.

5:00What you're seeing here is the parameters name, what is the parameter called

5:06and then

5:06what comes after that is the parameter value.

5:11So in this case, you just saw me type it right up above.

5:13You have a resource group name and then right here you see system string.

5:18This is basically saying text of the resource group name.

5:23Then I have name right here.

5:25Well, in this case, we were looking for an Azure virtual machine.

5:28So it's what is the name of the virtual machine and then text of the virtual

5:32machine name.

5:33What's confusing about this though for the first time you're seeing it are the

5:38brackets.

5:39Anything that's denoted in brackets is optional to type.

5:45So when I see get AZVM, it was optional for me to type out the parameter name

5:51resource

5:52group name.

5:53However, providing the resource group name was not optional.

5:58The system string right here is not in brackets.

6:01No, that means I have to provide it in order for this command to run.

6:05It was optional for me to provide the parameter name of name, but it was not

6:12optional for

6:13me to provide the parameter value of name.

6:16Check this out to confirm that.

6:18Watch this.

6:19I'm going to go back to my script above and I'm just going to delete out that

6:24and that.

6:26Okay.

6:27See, I have get Azure virtual machine, but I'm not specifying the explicit

6:32parameter resource

6:33group name.

6:34I'm just specifying that the resource group's name value, AZ140 demo goes there

6:39and the virtual

6:40machine name of PowerShell demo goes there.

6:43If I run this script one more time, does it still work?

6:47Hold your breath.

6:48Look at that.

6:49See, it's still worked.

6:51Why is this a thing?

6:53These are known as positional parameters.

6:58This means that resource group name right here always goes in the first

7:04position always.

7:05If resource group name for the get AZVM is always going to come first, there's

7:12no real

7:13reason to explicitly type it because we know the value that's provided here is

7:18going to

7:18be attached to the first parameter.

7:20And the virtual machine name always is the second parameter.

7:25So there's no real reason to have to specify that's the name because we know

7:28that the value

7:29that comes second is attached to the virtual machine name.

7:33Now look at this right here.

7:35You see this, this means that everything else in this block is going to be

7:42optional.

7:43We don't have to provide a status parameter.

7:47We don't have to provide a default profile parameter.

7:50We don't have to provide a default profile value.

7:54We don't have to provide display hint parameter or the value.

7:59These are all options that we can add to it.

8:02The only thing that are required are the things that aren't in brackets.

8:07Now wait, just wait, there's more.

8:10Get help is actually the abbreviated help.

8:14This is usually used when you just need to see, hey, what are the parameters

8:18that I have

8:18to require in order to run this command and are any of them positional.

8:24But if it's not really clear what the parameters actually mean or what you

8:28should do with this

8:29particular command, what you might want to run is just help, not get help, just

8:35help

8:35by itself.

8:36When you do help get a ZVM, you get a lot more output.

8:44See, it keeps going.

8:45Yeah, exactly.

8:46See, it's big.

8:48It comes with examples.

8:49It might show you what example outputs look like.

8:53But beyond that, look at this.

8:55When it comes down to the parameters, so you see the same beginning, you get

8:58the name,

8:58the synopsis and the syntax, but then scroll down to the parameters.

9:04The parameters here are sorted alphabetically.

9:07It'll tell you if it's required parameter, if it's a positional parameter, it

9:12'll even

9:12give you a description of what the parameter is trying to look for.

9:16So let's scroll down to resource group name.

9:19Look at this.

9:20It is a tricky one to interpret because when you look at required and it says

9:25false, you're

9:26like, wait a minute, remember typing resource group name is not required, but

9:33it is a positional

9:34parameter.

9:35It comes in position zero.

9:38So providing the value is definitely going to be required for this to work.

9:42So this was another really, really big video where at the surface level, it

9:46doesn't seem

9:46like we did a whole lot.

9:48We just tacked on two parameters that helps us find a virtual machine.

9:53But under the hood, learning where those parameters come from and how to

9:56interpret the help is

9:58actually a massive step in understanding how to work with PowerShell and

10:02navigate PowerShell.

10:03Here, I'm going to type Q right here so it exits out of that terminal real

10:08quick and

10:09back in my script.

10:10I'll just do a command Z to get my text back.

10:13Okay.

10:14So with that being said, in the next video, we're going to talk about the next

10:18step in

10:18working with PowerShell and that's variables.

10:21I hope this has been informative for you and I'd like to thank you for viewing.

0:00So get AZVM. Let's run it one more time. Let's go to run, start debugging.

0:06Pretty cool.

0:07I can get these details right here printed out to the terminal. But all this

0:10does is print it out to my terminal.

0:13And that really is just more like a command line at this point. And not like an

0:17object oriented programming language.

0:19This is where we start to shift our focus a little bit. This virtual machine,

0:23these details that I got right here,

0:25all belong to a single object. That is the virtual machine itself. These right

0:32here, these VM ID, name, type, location, tags,

0:36these are all properties that belong to this virtual machine. They define how

0:42this virtual machine is currently running.

0:45That is our object. So how could I start to use this? Well, one of the

0:50important things that we need to do is

0:53when we get details on an object, like my virtual machine, we need to hang on

0:57to those details for a little bit so that I could recall them later and maybe

1:03change them.

1:04This is usually done usually by variables. So when we use a variable, we run a

1:10commandlet like get AZVM.

1:14And what get AZVM is doing is it's returning the virtual machine back to the

1:19terminal right here and printing it out to the terminal.

1:22But what I might want to do instead is now save it in a variable and variables

1:27are denoted with a dollar sign.

1:30So you put dollar sign and then you give the variable any name that you want,

1:35like my VM. And you set it equal to your commandlet.

1:41Watch this. See how this syntax works. Right here in front of get AZVM, I'll

1:47put dollar sign, my VM,

1:50and set it equal to the results of get AZVM. Now, I'm going to save this and I

1:56'm going to run it.

1:57You're going to see the yellow squiggly lines right here. And it's warning you

2:00that, hey, you've created this variable,

2:03this variable, my VM, and we're even assigning data to it with the get AZVM

2:09commandlet.

2:10But you're not actually using it anywhere. Watch what happens when I actually

2:14run this commandlet now.

2:15I'll go to run and start debugging. See it down here? Hmm. Wait a minute. It

2:20ran the script right there on this line.

2:24And it didn't throw any errors. It didn't blow up on me. It just didn't return

2:28anything back to the terminal.

2:30That's because by default, when we run commandlets and then save the details in

2:34a variable, it's done just that.

2:36It's saved the details, the object, the virtual machine in my variable and done

2:42nothing else with it because we haven't told it now that you have these details

2:48in the variable.

2:50It's time to print them out or change some detail or some factor to it. So

2:55watch this.

2:56Whenever I want to recall the variable, like, printed out to the terminal, I

3:02can then just type right there, my VM.

3:06By simply just recalling it like my VM right here, that tells it print out the

3:10details to the terminal.

3:12So I'll run the script one more time and boom, there we go. Now it prints it

3:16out to the terminal.

3:18Even cooler, I can get smaller details of this virtual machine by using dotted

3:24notation.

3:26For instance, maybe I just want to get the name of my VM.

3:30So I'll say go into my VM that you have right here and just return the name

3:35property.

3:37So I'll save this, run it one more time.

3:41And there we go. Now it's printing out just the single property out to the

3:46terminal.

3:47So at this point, we're holding the virtual machine object in RAM and we can

3:52now use this virtual machine in different parts of our script.

3:57And that's where I'm going to end this video. I just wanted to introduce the

4:02concept of variables about holding details in RAM.

4:06Actually, I'm going to add one more thing to it. You don't have to hold the

4:09results of a command in a variable.

4:13You could actually hold anything that you want, like my string. And I could put

4:17here is some string, or I could put my number and say one, two, three, four,

4:28and I could put my array.

4:31And I can actually hold multiple things like you see right here could hold the

4:36value of one, two, or three.

4:39The point is, is variables can really hold any type of data, any data type or

4:43any structure or any object like a result of running any sort of command in a

4:49variable.

4:50You can then recall that variable or those details further on in your script.

4:56So this has been understanding variables. I hope this has been informative for

4:59you and I'd like to thank you for viewing.

0:00So this is where we go from the basics to pretty advanced stuff.

0:04At this point, we've talked pretty conceptually about the fact that get AZVM

0:10returns a virtual

0:11machine object.

0:13That virtual machine object has properties that define the virtual machine.

0:18We can store that virtual machine object in a variable.

0:22But now we really need to talk about the object itself and the pipeline.

0:29This is where the power and power shell comes from.

0:32And this is the part where your brain is going to melt a little bit, but bear

0:36with me on

0:37this one.

0:38Let's go back to help get AZVM.

0:41And I want to scroll down just to hair until we get to the outputs, scroll down

0:46, down,

0:47down.

0:48And here we see the outputs.

0:51What is this?

0:53This is the official object itself.

0:57This is the dot net defined object.

1:02Specifically, this is known as a class.

1:06Classes define the exact structure or properties that an object has.

1:13So in the event of a virtual machine, all of the properties like name, VMID,

1:21status or

1:22provisioning status, yada, yada, yada.

1:25All of those properties were predefined upfront, basically like a template.

1:31Put it in another simpler way.

1:33I wanted to define what a car was.

1:36Not a specific car, just in general, what a car is made of.

1:41It would have tires.

1:44It would have, you know, rows of seats.

1:47It would have a steering wheel.

1:52It would have an engine.

1:54It would have a transmission.

1:59And this would be how I might define my car class.

2:04So when I was ready to start creating specific cars, I might create a truck

2:11like a Ford F-150.

2:14And its tires might be, you know, 33 inch mud tires.

2:20It might have two rows.

2:22Of course, it'll have a steering wheel.

2:25It might have a V8 motor.

2:28It might have a six speed automatic transmission.

2:33This would stand in pretty stark contrast to something like a Tesla Model S pl

2:38aid, wouldn't

2:38it?

2:39It would have more like sport tires.

2:43It still has two rows and a steering wheel, but it has no motor.

2:48It has the electric motor.

2:51I don't even know what the transmission is, but it's going to be a great one

2:54because that

2:54thing does like zero to 16, two seconds.

2:57The point is, is we see how the car class defined a basic structure of what

3:02needs to

3:03happen to make a car.

3:05And then we can create different kinds of cars based on that structure.

3:09The same thing is happening here with the virtual machine.

3:13The class defines all of the properties that can be in a virtual machine.

3:18Even when you create a virtual machine, the values of those properties are what

3:22make it

3:23unique.

3:24So you might be thinking to yourself, well, what are all of the properties that

3:27could

3:28exist in a virtual machine?

3:30When you do help get a ZVM, you see this is the output object that it's going

3:35to get

3:36back to me.

3:37I'm going to copy this and flip on over to my documentation here for a second.

3:42I'm going to search for Microsoft and then paste in the actual property itself.

3:48The very first thing that comes up shows me the PS virtual machine class.

3:53Now when I scroll down, see here are the properties.

3:58These are all of the details that make up the virtual machine class.

4:03So this is really useful because you can immediately start seeing the kinds of

4:07data

4:07that you're going to be getting back from your PS virtual machine class, but it

4:13goes

4:13deeper than that.

4:14Look at this.

4:15If I run the commandlet one more time, let's go ahead and delete this out, save

4:19it, and

4:20run the commandlet to start debugging real quick.

4:24Let's pick on hardware profile for a second because this really defines the

4:28virtual machine

4:29size.

4:30You know, instead of seeing something like a D4, VS2 or whatever it is, it

4:37shows me

4:37VM size instead.

4:39What does that really mean?

4:40We'll flip on back here for a second and scroll up to hardware profile.

4:46When you give that a click, what you find now is that the hardware profile

4:51property,

4:53when you click this right here, this is what it's really referring to when we

4:56talk about

4:56the hardware profile property.

4:59So when you look at the property value, it shows you that your value is going

5:03to be a

5:03hardware profile.

5:05You give that a click and it is a subclass.

5:07There is a class inside the class.

5:10So when you scroll down some more, you start to see your properties are going

5:14to be your

5:15VM size.

5:19So if I'm thinking about it, I'm going to have my VM here, which has all the

5:23properties

5:24like the name, resource group name, and then it's going to have hardware

5:30profile, isn't

5:31it?

5:32So the hardware profile is going to have properties of its own.

5:36So it's properties within the properties.

5:38In this case, it'll have VM size and scroll down some more.

5:42You'll see it'll have VM size properties.

5:45So if I jump back to my terminal and bring up the my VM resource right here, I

5:52see the

5:52hardware profile refers to VM size.

5:55Would you remember how we could look into hardware profile?

5:59It was with the dotted notation, my VM hardware profile, I can tab to complete

6:05that and press

6:06enter and ah, look at that.

6:08See, now I see the sub properties of that particular class and this virtual

6:13machine is

6:14a standard B1s.

6:16Pretty cool.

6:17But I want you to see where it gets even more powerful than this.

6:21It's not just the fact that we've defined the object by defining its properties

6:25through

6:25a class and then maybe sub classes with sub properties.

6:30It's also how we use it in PowerShell.

6:33Get a ZVM does an incredible job of getting the details of a virtual machine.

6:38But what happens when I want to stop the virtual machine from running?

6:43Let's see.

6:44If I do help stop a ZVM to turn it off and press help right here, this is a

6:49valid PowerShell

6:51command.

6:52It stops an Azure virtual machine.

6:54So check this out.

6:55I'm going to show you this is the really, really cool part.

6:57Scroll on down past the parameters and see it accepts one input and that is via

7:05string.

7:06Now it's going to turn out a specific object.

7:09It's the compute long running operation.

7:11It's basically just a true or false.

7:13Did it run?

7:14But what is this input of string?

7:16That's just text.

7:17Well, with a little bit of help, we can go back to our parameters up above and

7:22we see

7:23stop a ZVM again is looking for a resource group name and the virtual machine

7:29name.

7:30Well, we got those already from get a ZVM and this is where the true power of

7:36PowerShell

7:37comes in.

7:39Check this out.

7:40I've got the virtual machine.

7:42I'm storing it in a variable.

7:45Now I want to use it.

7:47So what I'm going to do is I'm going to call the variable right there by just

7:51saying

7:51my VM, but I'm going to pipe it into stop a ZVM.

8:00I don't have to type anything else.

8:02Why?

8:03How does that work?

8:04The power in PowerShell comes from the fact that we can take an object, whether

8:10from a

8:10commandlet or from a variable and send it into a proceeding commandlet and it's

8:19smart

8:19enough to match the resource group name and name parameters from the input

8:27object.

8:29Let that digest for a second.

8:31The virtual machine has a property of resource group name and name.

8:38When I send this variable into stop VM, it's smart enough to map this virtual

8:45machine's

8:46resource group name to the resource group name parameter in stop a ZVM and this

8:52variable's

8:53name property to the name parameter in stop a ZVM.

8:59So watch this.

9:00I'm going to do command S right here to save my script and we're going to go to

9:07run and

9:07start debugging.

9:09There it goes.

9:10Okay, it says, do you want to stop the specified virtual machine?

9:13I'll say yes.

9:16And then you wait a few seconds because this is a long running operation.

9:20I'll come back to it when it's done.

9:21I'm going to pause right here.

9:23And there we go.

9:24It looks like after 48 seconds looking at the screen right here, the operation

9:29has succeeded.

9:30Do you see how powerful that could be?

9:33Now watch this.

9:34I'll delete variables entirely and show you how we can just use the command

9:39lists to work

9:40directly with each other.

9:42Start a ZVM and watch this.

9:45I'm going to use the force parameter right here.

9:48So that way any of these prompts right here that say, hey, are you sure you

9:51want to continue?

9:52Force automatically accepts that more or less.

9:54It makes it go and forces the command to run.

9:58So in this case, I'm not storing anything with variables.

10:00I just want the virtual machine to start.

10:02So I'm going to get the virtual machine with this commandlet and immediately

10:06pass the resulting

10:07output, the PS virtual machine class object directly into the start a Z VM

10:14commandlet.

10:15We're going to run it one more time.

10:17This will probably take.

10:18Oh, oh, start a ZVM does not have a force parameter on it.

10:21Silly me.

10:22We'll go ahead and command S and run it one more time.

10:27And there it goes.

10:28It's going to take, you know, 30 or 40 seconds.

10:29So I'll come back to it once it's done.

10:3223 seconds is what it took to start that virtual machine and the operation has

10:36succeeded.

10:37So this really ratcheted our skills up a notch, didn't it?

10:42We talked a lot about where objects really come from.

10:46Importantly, how can you find out what objects a particular commandlet is

10:50working with, both

10:52as an input as well as an output?

10:55Where can you find out what what what properties come with a given object?

11:00And then how do you pass an object from one commandlet to the next using the

11:06pipeline?

11:07This is where object oriented programming and the power and power shall come

11:11from.

11:12I hope this has been informative for you and I'd like to thank you for viewing.

0:00Now, the final thing I want to leave you with here is so that you can get

0:03started directly

0:04from your terminal or understand how it is that you can begin working with

0:08Azure.

0:09This is another critical thing to understand when it comes to working with

0:12PowerShell.

0:13You can do this, what I'm about to do, you can do this from the terminal in VS

0:16code if

0:17that's what you want to do.

0:18That's going to be perfectly acceptable or you can do it from just a standard

0:21shell.

0:22Now, here I am on Mac OS.

0:24I need to launch into PowerShell first by typing PWSH.

0:27Now, here's the kicker.

0:29My computer, this shell that I'm in right now has no direct connection to Azure

0:34by default.

0:36I have to log into Azure from this PowerShell terminal.

0:40The commandlet to do that is log in AZ account.

0:45Press enter and watch what it does.

0:46It launches a terminal, right?

0:49Or excuse me, it launches a web browser where I can then say I'm logged in with

0:53this account.

0:54Let's go ahead and click OK to proceed logging in.

0:57It tells you authentication is complete, you can return to your application.

1:00Flip on back and it's sure enough, I am logged in to my account.

1:05Now in this case, I see right here that it logged in, but importantly, it has a

1:09default

1:10subscription set within the shell itself.

1:13If I have multiple subscriptions, which I do, this could become a problem

1:17because with

1:18the default subscription set to pay as you go, when I specify things like my

1:23resource

1:23group, it's going to be looking for resource groups that belong to the pay as

1:27you go subscription.

1:29You may want to change that.

1:30So check this out.

1:31We'll do something like get AZ subscription and press enter right here to see

1:36the list

1:36of my AZ subscriptions.

1:39Now I see my AZ subscriptions listed here.

1:43Let's have some fun.

1:44What I want to do is I want to get a specific AZ subscription, but be able to

1:50pipe it in

1:51to a set AZ or select AZ subscription to change my default subscription.

1:56So in this case, I'd be changing from my pay as you go to my Knox's

2:01subscription.

2:02Well, this is an interesting one, isn't it?

2:04Because this particular commandlet returned two objects back to me.

2:09So what happens when I want to filter this down to only one?

2:12Watch this.

2:13I can do get AZ subscription.

2:16I'll send them both, both objects immediately in the pipeline to a commandlet

2:22called where

2:23object.

2:25This is a where clause where we're looking for a specific property.

2:29What we do here is a little quirky.

2:31So follow me on this.

2:32We're going to open up braces and then we're going to say dollar underscore

2:37period.

2:38Now what does this mean?

2:39This means I want to evaluate each one of these objects.

2:44We're going to evaluate both the pay as you go subscription and the Knox's

2:48subscription.

2:49What are we going to evaluate?

2:51We're going to say where the property of name is equal.

2:55We specify this with hyphen EQ and then we're going to look for something

3:00called Knox's.

3:02So immediately I'm not going to run the rest of this.

3:04You can see it kind of showing me a syntax, you know, option right there.

3:08I'm just going to run this particular commandlet.

3:10So you can see what it does with the where object.

3:13Now I'm getting both subscription objects, passing them into my where clause.

3:20I'm evaluating both objects, the name property, and I'm finding the one that is

3:26equal to the

3:27Knox's name right there.

3:29So now I have my specific subscription that I care about.

3:33What I'm now going to do is I'm going to pipe that further down the pipeline

3:38and say

3:39select AZ subscription and press enter.

3:45Remember this is cool because it's going to be smart enough to know to take

3:49this input

3:50object right here and all of the required parameters that select AZ

3:54subscription needs

3:56to know like the name or the ID or the tenant ID or the state.

4:01All of those are going to be mapped directly in.

4:04So I don't have to specify any of those other parameters.

4:07I press enter, I wait a few seconds, a few seconds more, and there it is.

4:13It's done.

4:15This output with no errors right here tells me that my current default AZ

4:20subscription

4:21is now set to be my Knox's subscription instead of my pay as you go

4:25subscription.

4:27This is reinforcing the power of the pipeline while also adding a little new

4:31thing for you

4:32to where you can figure out how do I filter out the results when I have

4:36multiple objects

4:37returned back to me.

4:38This is using the where object clause.

4:40PowerShell is extremely powerful and I can't stress this enough.

4:44We've really only touched on the tip of the iceberg.

4:47This was really only meant to be a primer to get you the bare minimum that you

4:51need in

4:52order to start working with it throughout this course.

4:54But I really want to stress that you need to take the time to learn more about

4:59PowerShell

5:00and dig deep into the really nitty gritty features that it can do.

5:05We have content dedicated to just learning PowerShell version 7 right here at

5:10CBT Nuggets.

5:11It is worth your few hours to hit that search bar and watch that content end to

5:17end.

5:17No matter what your role is in the technical environment, you will be better

5:21for learning

5:22this.

5:24And at this point, you also know how to get your shell logged in to Azure.

5:29Now you can do things like get AZVM, specify a resource group name of AZ140

5:38demo and a name

5:40of PowerShell demo because I'm logged into Azure.

5:45Uh oh.

5:46Well, obviously that's in a different subscription.

5:49I just changed my subscription to be the Knox's subscription.

5:53Hang on.

5:54Let's hit up a couple of times and change this back to pay as you go.

5:57Let's do that real quick.

5:59Duh.

6:00Should have thought about that pay as you go.

6:04All lowercase.

6:05Yep.

6:06Case sensitive does matter on Linux based machines.

6:08So we'll change my subscription back and hit up a couple of times, get the

6:13virtual machine

6:13details.

6:14There it is.

6:16So now we know how to log into Azure from the shell.

6:20How do we set our subscription?

6:22We also learned about how to do things like filtering with the Wear Object

6:25clause.

6:26I hope this has been informative for you and I'd like to thank you for viewing.

0:00My challenge to you was to understand the subscription object and its available

0:06properties.

0:07So where do you go to figure out what the name or the name of the class is that

0:12defines

0:13the subscription object?

0:14That was the help clause.

0:16So we'll say help get a Z subscription right here.

0:21Scroll on down until you get to the outputs.

0:24Hang on, I got to scroll up.

0:26I got to find these outputs.

0:28There it is right there.

0:29It's not easy to see.

0:30There's inputs of a string and outputs right here.

0:33PS Azure subscription is the object that you're looking for.

0:38Flip on back to documentation.

0:40We'll search for Microsoft.

0:43Paste in the object itself.

0:45There is the PS Azure subscription class.

0:48And from here, you can see the properties of that Azure subscription.

0:53It's really, really important to understand how commandlets treat objects, both

0:58as in

0:58inputs, as well as outputs, and understanding what are the properties that are

1:02going to

1:03come back from these particular objects.

1:06I hope this has been informative for you and I'd like to thank you for viewing.