Professional Windows® PowerShell

2.4. Summary

Windows command line tools have existed for many years in a context where graphical tools were Microsoft's preferred approach. As a result, development of the Windows command line has been neglected and doesn't meet the needs of today's businesses or system administrators.

• The toolset of CMD.exe covers only a limited range of the tasks that an administrator needs to carry out.

• The syntax of command line tools and batch files means that batch files are limited in the logic they can easily implement. Lengthy batch files are often difficult to read and understand.

• The language of batch files is very different from the scripting languages, such as VBScript and JScript, needed to get more complex tasks done.

• There is no way to capture a task done using a graphical tool and create the corresponding command line syntax.

In Chapter 3, I will describe the approach that Windows PowerShell takes to these issues and discuss how, even in version 1, Windows PowerShell provides a better and more consistent way to handle a substantial number of system administration tasks.