In the last few years, the scripting world has witnessed a number of changes. We can hardly recall the time when people used ancient mainframe machines with green-colored text and a black screen background. But now, times have changed and we are, in fact, living in a world where technology adoption is quicker than ever.

Now, an ample number of scripting languages exist that can fulfill the needs of an administrator. One of the questions that arise in one's mind is: Why should I go with Windows PowerShell?

There are certain reasons why we prefer Windows PowerShell over other scripting languages. I have intentionally included this short note at the beginning of this book to give you a clear understanding of this scripting language.

For example, there are strong scripting languages, such as VBScript, Ruby, Python, and Perl, which administrators have adopted as well. VBScript became popular because of the automation of routine local administrator tasks, but the code was a bit complex and hard to understand for novice users. Looking at Windows PowerShell, I feel the Microsoft team has worked hard and gifted us a powerful, interactive scripting shell with an object-driven approach.

The important and exciting thing about this language is its object-based output, which can be easily reused. It has "pipeline" and "PSRemoting" as its crucial features, which puts this language as the first priority in comparison with other scripting languages.

So far, we have had four stable versions available for Windows PowerShell. Windows PowerShell v1.0 was an extension of the command prompt, but with a limited number of commands. In Version 2, the team introduced the pipeline and PSRemoting concepts, which made Windows PowerShell a popular scripting shell. Furthermore, with the release of Windows Server 2012 and Windows 8, they have drastically improved with Windows PowerShell Version 3.0 in terms of the number of CMDLETs and built-in modules. They have also introduced Windows PowerShell Web Access (PWA), PowerShell workflows, and Scheduled Jobs concepts in this version. The exciting part is that, while we are in the process of publishing this book, the Microsoft team is working on the next release of its operating systems named Windows Server 2012 R2 and Windows 8.1. In the next release, they have Windows PowerShell v4.0 embedded with extensive functionality, for example, Desired State Configuration (DSC) and so on.

In this book, we have mostly covered new CMDLETs, which were introduced in v3.0 and v4.0. Also, we will draft some functionality changes that exist in the latest versions of Windows PowerShell.