PowerShell
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To display JSON in a structured and readable format directly in PowerShell, you can pipe a JSON string through ConvertFrom-Json and then ConvertTo-Json with an appropriate -Depth parameter. This allows you to avoid using intermediary variables and outputs neatly formatted JSON directly to the console.

Example:

'{"name":"John","age":30,"address":{"street":"123 Main St","city":"Anytown"},"phones":["123-4567","987-6543"]}' 
| ConvertFrom-Json 
| ConvertTo-Json -Depth 10

Explanation:

  • ConvertFrom-Json parses the raw JSON string into a PowerShell object.
  • ConvertTo-Json re-serializes the object with proper indentation.
  • The -Depth parameter ensures that nested objects are fully expanded in the output.

This approach is useful for quickly inspecting JSON structures without needing temporary variables or additional tools.

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The msDS-UserPasswordExpiryTimeComputed attribute in Active Directory stores the user’s password expiration time as a large integer in Windows FileTime format. This format counts 100-nanosecond intervals from January 1, 1601 (UTC). To get a readable date and time, you must convert this number to a standard datetime format using the appropriate method for your platform.

How to Convert:

  • Use built-in functions like FromFileTimeUtc in PowerShell or .NET.
  • In Python, add the FileTime interval (converted to microseconds) to the epoch starting at 1601-01-01.

Example in PowerShell:

[DateTime]::FromFileTimeUtc($filetimeValue)

Handling the Special “Magic” Number:
If the value equals 9223372036854775807 (the maximum 64-bit integer), it is a special indicator that the password never expires. This number is not a real timestamp and should not be converted to a date. Instead, treat it as a flag meaning “no expiration.”

Summary:

  • Convert valid FileTime values to datetime for expiry information.
  • Recognize 9223372036854775807 as a sentinel meaning “password never expires.” Avoid converting this sentinel to a datetime.
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This solution demonstrates how to retrieve the password expiration date of a user account in Active Directory using PowerShell. It uses the Get-ADUser cmdlet from the Active Directory module and queries the msDS-UserPasswordExpiryTimeComputed property, which holds the computed expiration date in FILETIME format.

If querying by -Identity returns an error such as "Cannot find an object with identity," switching to a -Filter approach with the SamAccountName is recommended. Also, ensure that the Active Directory module is imported, the domain context is correct, and the executing user has appropriate permissions.

# Import the Active Directory module if not already loaded
Import-Module ActiveDirectory

# Replace 'username' with the actual SamAccountName of the user
$user = Get-ADUser -Filter {SamAccountName -eq "username"} -Properties msDS-UserPasswordExpiryTimeComputed

# Convert the FILETIME to a readable DateTime object
$passwordExpiry = if ($user."msDS-UserPasswordExpiryTimeComputed") {
    [datetime]::FromFileTime($user."msDS-UserPasswordExpiryTimeComputed")
} else {
    "Password does not expire or no expiration set."
}

# Output the result
[PSCustomObject]@{
    UserName       = $user.SamAccountName
    PasswordExpiry = $passwordExpiry
}

Key Points:

  • Use -Filter with SamAccountName to avoid identity resolution issues.
  • The property msDS-UserPasswordExpiryTimeComputed returns the expiration time as FILETIME.
  • Convert FILETIME to DateTime for human-readable output.
  • Confirm the environment context and permissions to avoid access errors.
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To see all the services on your system, use the Get-Service cmdlet:

Get-Service
 

This outputs a list showing:

  • Name: The internal service name.
  • DisplayName: A user-friendly name.
  • Status: Indicates whether the service is running, stopped, or paused.

This command helps you get an overview of all services and their current state.

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PowerShell is a powerful tool for managing system services, offering flexibility and control through straightforward commands. This guide covers the essentials of listing, searching, and managing services.

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You often need administrative privileges to manage services. Running PowerShell as an administrator ensures you have the necessary permissions to start, stop, or modify services.

Steps:

  1. Right-click the PowerShell icon.
  2. Select Run as Administrator.
  3. Confirm the User Account Control (UAC) prompt, if it appears.
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In PowerShell, you can show elapsed time using a simple timer script. Start by capturing the current time when your script begins with $StartTime = $(Get-Date). Then, calculate the elapsed time by subtracting the start time from the current time: $elapsedTime = $(Get-Date) - $StartTime. Format the elapsed time into hours, minutes, and seconds using the "{0:HH:mm:ss}" format and apply it to a DateTime object: $totalTime = "{0:HH:mm:ss}" -f ([datetime]$elapsedTime.Ticks)

$StartTime = $(Get-Date)
# Your script here
$elapsedTime = $(Get-Date) - $StartTime
$totalTime = "{0:HH:mm:ss}" -f ([datetime]$elapsedTime.Ticks)
Write-Host "Total elapsed time: $totalTime"

For more details and discussions, you can refer to this Stack Overflow post.

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The Invoke-WebRequest PowerShell cmdlet is used to fetch content from a web page on the internet. It allows you to make HTTP requests, retrieve HTML content, and interact with web APIs directly from your PowerShell script.

Gets content from a web page on the internet.

# Here we are asking Google about PowerShell and saving the response
$Response = Invoke-WebRequest -URI https://www.google.com/search?q=powershell

# We use the Content property of $Response to access the webpage content
$Response.Content

In the example above, $Response will store the content retrieved from the specified URL (https://www.google.com/search?q=powershell). You can then use $Response to parse and extract information from the web page as needed.

To learn more about Invoke-WebRequest, you can visit the Microsoft documentation page. This resource provides detailed information and examples to help you understand and use this cmdlet effectively.

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Join-Path is a PowerShell cmdlet that combines a base path and a child path into a single one. This is useful for constructing file or directory paths dynamically. The syntax for using Join-Path is:

Join-Path -Path <base path> -ChildPath <child path>

Here's an example of using Join-Path to create a file path:

$directory = "C:\MyFolder"
$filename = "example"
$path = Join-Path -Path $directory -ChildPath "$($filename).txt"

In this example, $directory is the base path, $filename is the child path, and "$($filename).txt" is the desired file extension. Join-Path combines these to create the full file path, which would be "C:\MyFolder\example.txt".

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Using the *-Content cmdlets. There are four *-Content cmdlets:

  • Add-Content – appends content to a file.
  • Clear-Content – removes all content of a file.
  • Get-Content – retrieves the content of a file.
  • Set-Content – writes new content which replaces the content in a file.

The two cmdlets you use to send command or script output to a file are Set-Content and Add-Content. Both cmdlets convert the objects you pass in the pipeline to strings and then output these strings to the specified file. A very important point here – if you pass either cmdlet a non-string object, these cmdlets use each object’s ToString() method to convert the object to a string before outputting it to the file.

See more at How to send output to a file - PowerShell Community (microsoft.com)

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