Category Archives: Scripting & programming

Somthing about Powershell, VB Script, C#, VB.NET

Powershell, Windows knowhow

Powershell: Error while calling the SaveAs Method of some Office Applications

1 Comment

Hi,

if you tried to save a word or excel document as another format you got an error. For example, if you want to convert a CSV File to a Excel workbook and save it in Excel 95/97/2003 format.

[reflection.assembly]::LoadWithPartialName("Microsoft.Office.InterOp.Excel")
$oExcel = New-Object -ComObject "Excel.Application"
$sCSVFile="D:\temp\ImportFile.csv"
$oExcel.Visible = $true
$oCSVWorkbook=$oExcel.Workbooks.Add()
$oExcel.Workbooks.OpenText($sCSVFile)
$oCSVWorkbook.SaveAs("D:\temp\test.xls",[Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel.XlFileFormat]::xlExcel9795)
Exception calling "SaveAs" with "1" argument(s): "SaveAs method of Workbook class failed"
At D:\test\CSV2Excel.ps1:29 char:20
+ $xl_workbook.SaveAs <<<< ("D:\Temp\test.xls")
    + CategoryInfo          : NotSpecified: (:) [], MethodInvocationException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : ComMethodTargetInvocation

Continue reading Powershell: Error while calling the SaveAs Method of some Office Applications →

Powershell, Windows knowhow, Windows Scripts

Windows: Powershell script to fix and repair WMI

6 Comments

Hi,

this script repairs and recreates the WMI Repository of a Windows. For example, this occurs sometimes if you clone a Windows machine with an installed SCCM/SMS Client. The typical error in this case is “Failed to open to WMI namespace ‘\\.\root\CCM\SoftwareUpdates\DeploymentAgent’ (8007045b)”

Lasts start. Start a Powershell console as Administrator. Stop all services. Sometimes other services depends on the WMI Service and does not accept a stop request. Therefore you cannot stop the WMI service. TrendMicro Office is such a service. You have to kill them by TaskManager.

# Stop WMI
# Only if SCCM/SMS Client is installed. Stop ccmexec.
Stop-Service -Force ccmexec -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
Stop-Service -Force winmgmt

(Re)Register WMI binary components

[String[]]$aWMIBinaries=@("unsecapp.exe","wmiadap.exe","wmiapsrv.exe","wmiprvse.exe","scrcons.exe")
foreach ($sWMIPath in @(($ENV:SystemRoot+"\System32\wbem"),($ENV:SystemRoot+"\SysWOW64\wbem"))){
	if(Test-Path -Path $sWMIPath){
		push-Location $sWMIPath
		foreach($sBin in $aWMIBinaries){
			if(Test-Path -Path $sBin){
				$oCurrentBin=Get-Item -Path  $sBin
				Write-Host " Register $sBin"
				& $oCurrentBin.FullName /RegServer
			}
			else{
				# Warning only for System32
				if($sWMIPath -eq $ENV:SystemRoot+"\System32\wbem"){
					Write-Warning "File $sBin not found!"
				}
			}
		}
		Pop-Location
	}
}

Reregister WMI Managed Objects
Continue reading Windows: Powershell script to fix and repair WMI →

Powershell, Windows Scripts

Powershell: Check for Administrator rights

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Hi,

for a lot of powershell scripts Administrator permissions are necessary. In powershell, you can check if you are elevated by the following script code.
Insert the snippet at the top of your script. It checks the credentials and exits the script if the administrator permissions are missing.
Continue reading Powershell: Check for Administrator rights →

Windows Scripts, XML

Powershell: Some basic XML handling with Powershell and .NET

9 Comments

Hi everybody,

here are some fundamentals to handle XML Files with powershell.

The following commands uses these XML File


<config description="Config file for testing">
    <system description="Document Management">
        <document authorFirstName="Kirk" authorSurname="Author1" date="20130503 01:15:43" description="Document Hammet" index="3">C:\temp\doc0001.txt</document>
        <document authorFirstName="Lars" authorSurname="Author5" date="20130503 10:05:42" description="Document Ulrich" index="4">C:\temp\doc0002.txt</document>
        <document authorFirstName="Cliff" authorSurname="Author5" date="20130612 11:54:33" description="Document Burton"  index="6">C:\temp\doc0051.txt</document>
        <document authorFirstName="Jason" authorSurname="Author2" date="20130806 04:02:41" description="Document Newsted"  index="1">C:\temp\doc0041.txt</document>
        <document authorFirstName="Robert" authorSurname="Smith" date="20131202 07:12:03" description="Document Trujillo"  index="2">C:\temp\doc0012.txt</document>
        <document authorFirstName="James" authorSurname="Smith" date="20130211 09:05:59" description="Document Hetfield"  index="5">C:\temp\doc0003.txt</document>
    </system>
</config>

Creating  a XML File, create a document root, create subelements, add and set attributes, save the file

# Create a new XML File with config root node
[System.XML.XMLDocument]$oXMLDocument=New-Object System.XML.XMLDocument
# New Node
[System.XML.XMLElement]$oXMLRoot=$oXMLDocument.CreateElement("config")
# Append as child to an existing node
$oXMLDocument.appendChild($oXMLRoot)
# Add a Attribute
$oXMLRoot.SetAttribute("description","Config file for testing")
[System.XML.XMLElement]$oXMLSystem=$oXMLRoot.appendChild($oXMLDocument.CreateElement("system"))
$oXMLSystem.SetAttribute("description","Document Management")
# Save File
$oXMLDocument.Save("c:\temp\config.xml")

Loading an existing XML File, read an element, do some XPATH queries

Continue reading Powershell: Some basic XML handling with Powershell and .NET →

C#, Windows knowhow

Windows: Create a new local User Account and add them to a local group by using .NET and C#

2 Comments

Hi,

a short post. It describes how to create a new local Windows User account and add them to an existing local user group.

First of all, include the following references in your project:


using System.DirectoryServices;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;

Create a new User with local administrator rights.

// define Username and Password
const string USER_NAME = "NewAdmin";
char[] aPWchars = { 'P', 'a', 's', 's' , 'w', 'o', 'r', 'd'};
System.Security.SecureString oPW = new System.Security.SecureString();
foreach (char cChr in aPWchars) {
    oPW.AppendChar(cChr);
}
// Get Computerobject via ADSI
DirectoryEntry oComputer = new DirectoryEntry("WinNT://" + Environment.MachineName + ",computer");
// New User
DirectoryEntry oNewUser = oComputer.Children.Add(USER_NAME, "user");
// define Pointer to a string
IntPtr pString = IntPtr.Zero;
// Pointer to password
pString = Marshal.SecureStringToGlobalAllocUnicode(oPW);
// Set password
oNewUser.Invoke("SetPassword", new object[] { Marshal.PtrToStringUni(pString) });
// Add a description
oNewUser.Invoke("Put", new object[] { "Description", "New Administrator" });
// Save changes
oNewUser.CommitChanges();
// Cleanup and free Password pointer
Marshal.ZeroFreeGlobalAllocUnicode(pString);
// Get Group
DirectoryEntry oGroup = oComputer.Children.Find("Administrators", "group");
// And add the recently created user
oGroup.Invoke("Add", new object[] { oNewUser.Path.ToString() });

Michael