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Module Monday January 23, 2023

January 23, 2023 by ClaytonT Leave a Comment

It’s already the 4th Monday in January, can you believe it? At least that means we get an extra Module Monday next week, but lets stick to this one for right now!

Enjoy Markdown, and want to generate markdown help for your existing module, or create markdown help for modules you are currently working on? PlatyPS is the module you need.

Supported scenarios:

  • Create Markdown
    • Using existing external help files (MAML schema, XML).
    • Using reflection
    • Using reflection and existing internal external help files.
    • For a single cmdlet
    • For an entire module
  • Update existing Markdown through reflection.
  • Create a module page .md with summary. It will also allow you to create updatable help cab.
  • Retrieve markdown metadata from markdown file.
  • Create external help xml files (MAML) from platyPS Markdown.
  • Create external help file cab
  • Preview help from generated maml file.

If any of that looks to be useful, definitely check out PlatyPS!

Github:
PlatyPS

Tagged With: Documentation, Markdown, Module Monday, PowerShell

Read-Only Friday January 13, 2023

January 13, 2023 by ClaytonT 2 Comments

Today’s Read-Only Friday is about retiring/upgrading servers. Don’t worry no changing code today, but with Server 2012R2 going end of support Oct 10, 2023, I want to make sure you are aware and prepared to do it. By no means is this the definitive guide to do it, but hope this helps you create or improve your process for upgrading servers. Right now, I’d put a reminder in your calendar so you don’t forget and that you have enough time to take action on those servers.

I know it will depend greatly on what is on the server, but first thing before doing anything is making sure you have a valid backup. I’m not just talking about that your backup server of choice says it backed it up successfully, but actually restoring the server/files needed from the backup to ensure it works. We are decommissioning it for a reason, but while going through the process we want to make sure we have a backup just in case.

Next, I’d go through the server and make sure all services/software are documented as well as any important files. Even if you have documentation, I’d double check that all of it is correct, and that someone didn’t go out of scope and install something on it without documenting it. The last thing you need is when you shutdown the server or setup the replacement server that a department can’t do their work because the product they need isn’t online anymore.

A PowerShell one liner I’d recommend is “Get-WindowsFeature | Where installed” for one computer or you could run “Get-WindowsFeature -computername serv01,serv02 | Where installed” then you could pipe it to CSV or Excel to make it easier for documentation.

Then to get all programs installed

$InstalledSoftware = Get-ChildItem "HKLM:\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall"

foreach($obj in $InstalledSoftware){write-host $obj.GetValue('DisplayName') -NoNewline; write-host " - " -NoNewline; write-host $obj.GetValue('DisplayVersion')}

This can be exported as well for easier documention as well.

Now that we know we have good back ups, we know what services/applications installed, and we did a once over for any out scope configs, I would ask your team to look over what you have to make sure nothing was missed. The more you do these, the less time it will take, but it’s always good to have a second set of eyes on it.

Great, with it having a second set of eyes on it, we can now build the new machine. Depending on your virtualization platform(Hoping you a test environment, if not look at AutomatedLabs), I’d create a PowerShell script to build the server, or if you have templates already, I’d use PowerShell to make the copy then configure IP and any one off applications and servers, as well as any files that would need to be on it. Make sure all windows updates are done to ensure none of them will break it. Once you have confirmed everything is working on the newer server os, you can now deploy it to production(Make sure to turn off the old one if it will cause issues). Before deploying it to production, I’d send out communication to users in case for some reason there is an issue, they will let you know right away or if there is anything they have to do on their side.

At this point I’d put all of the documentation for the new server together if you haven’t already which should be easy, as most of it is right in scripts. Once the new server has been working for a safe amount of time as it will depend on the importance of server, you can remove the old server and test server from your host(s).

I could definitely go in more depth on this, and if you have any questions on checklists or what to actually keep for documentation, let me know and I’d be glad to help out.

And yes, I know this is a Read-Only Friday topic, but most of the hard work is on the planning/documenting side which you can do on Read-Only Friday.

Tagged With: Automation, Documentation, EOL, PowerShell, Read-Only Friday, Upgrading, Windows Server

Read-Only Friday November 18, 2022

November 18, 2022 by ClaytonT Leave a Comment

It’s coming to the end of the year and only a handful more ROF for this year, which can also mean agreements and renewals for a lot of people. How do you manage them? Do you have dedicated software, excel, sharepoint, SQL, or something else?

Do you have any automation built in for reminders to bring up to management, reminders for yourself, and/or request quotes from vendors? And yes I said for yourself, who enjoys renewing software then realizing you didn’t put in the new license and everything stops..

Going a little deeper, what about  cost wise? Do you have it so you can see upcoming costs and expected costs for the year. I know not all organizations are lucky enough to have enterprise grade software and/or dedicated departments to manage all of this. For smaller organizations, it can easily start out as an excel/sharepoint/google sheet and grow into local/cloud SQL or other scaleable solution. If you start now though, you’ll know what you want and don’t want which will make selecting solutions much easier. And from my years in the industry I can tell you that even with enterprise grade software you will still need to do some custom integrations, just a lot less of them.

Tagged With: Documentation, PowerShell, Read-Only Friday, Reporting

Read-Only Friday October 28, 2022

October 28, 2022 by ClaytonT Leave a Comment

It’s Friday and the day for no major unplanned changes to your infrastructure.

How does your team share documentation between each other? Is it all in GitHub, Teams, Sharepoint, OneNote, Notion, ConnectWise, BookStack, etc? Or is it simple as word docs on a network share? Would you recommend the current way you are doing it?

If you use a combination, I’d love to hear the process of how you have it setup. If you prefer, you can message me, and I’ll do a summary of what everyone is using.

I know I have friends in all different size companies, curious to see how some of the solutions scale.

Tagged With: Documentation, PowerShell, Read-Only Friday

Read-Only Friday October 14, 2022

October 14, 2022 by ClaytonT Leave a Comment

Todays selection is tough only because it’s so easy but we never do it…

Organize those repositories. Go through your GitHub, local drive, azure, or wherever else you keep your scripts and give them the once over to see what you still need to keep. Your future self will thank you. For one, it will be easier to find scripts and two, you may find a script you forgot you had that you needed for a recent project. Furthermore, you may review some of the code and see some quick updates that you can do or make the script more flexible or powerful( if it’s affects more than your computer or can’t be done in a test environment, I’d wait till Monday).

Schedule the time in now to make sure you do it, so the next time you or your coworkers take a look at the repositories, it a joy and not a game of Guess Who.

Tagged With: Documentation, Organization, PowerShell, Read-Only Friday

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Clayton Tyger

Tech enthusiast dad who has lost 100lbs and now sometimes has crazy running/biking ideas. Read More…

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