Create an integrated (WPF based) ISE Add-On with PowerShell

The goal of this post is to show you how to create an ISE Add-On that integrates itself graphically in a similar way as the built-in Show-Command Add-On (using the VerticalAddOnTools pane) without having to use Visual Studio and writing the code in C#. As an example I will walk you through the steps to …

Using Microsoft SyncToy through PowerShell

This post is about running Microsoft SyncToy via PowerShell. For those that don't know SyncToy: SyncToy 2.1 is a free application that synchronizes files and folders between locations. Typical uses include sharing files, such as photos, with other computers and creating backup copies of files and folders. SyncToy has been around already since good old …

Using the String.Split method with multiple separator characters in PowerShell

This post is about what I thought of an odd behaviour when calling the .NET String.Split method with multiple separator characters from PowerShell. I first came across this myself but didn't really pay much attention to it. Only after reading about it again over on Tommy Maynard's blog, I decided to find out more. Let's …

Adding ‘Edit with PowerShell ISE’ and ‘Open PowerShell here (as Admin)’ to the context menu

In order to edit PowerShell files within PowerShell ISE I used to just drag and drop them from Windows Explorer into the ISE scripting pane. Unfortunately this doesn't work anymore (I believe since Windows 8). The best explanation for the behaviour I found is here. In short drag and drop doesn't work from Windows Explorer …

Automatically convert an Excel table to a checklist for JIRA

JIRA supports a subset of Wiki Markup to add tables and other formatting to fields like Description or Comments. Writing the Wiki Markup manually is quite time consuming though. To make the process a bit easier I ended up writing a Macro that converts an Excel based task tracker list into JIRA. From this: Into …

A nicer PromptForChoice for the PowerShell Console Host

Sometimes it's not possible to fully automate a certain process and we need some input from the user(s) of the script in order to determine the further path of action. If this is based on a fixed set of choices the built-in PromptForChoice method can come to the rescue. Here is an example: https://gist.github.com/778414455f932e1f9ac8 Running …

Automatically clean-up excel data with multiple entries per cell separated by comma or line-breaks

This is a follow-up from a previous post where I did the same using PowerShell. A short recap first. The goal is to turn something like this: Into this: In the original state some of the cells have multiple entries that are either separated by comma or line-breaks (via Alt+Enter). Furthermore several of those entries …

Use PowerShell to open regedit at a specific path or RegJump for PowerShell

Even though PowerShell contains everything to read and write to the registry I still find myself quite frequently opening the registry editor (aka regedit.exe). Since navigating the tree manually can be quite time consuming I used to rely on RegJump developed by Mark Russinovich. I was wondering if the same could be implemented using PowerShell …