There is a lot of new stuff in the imminent 2.0 release of the PowerShell Console for Sitecore. Some of it is fairly obvious like the improved console window, some of it not so much. The aim of the console has always be to enable Sitecore developers to extend the CMS in new exciting ways. For this to happen it had to become a mini-platform on its own. So far you could use it to add scripts to ribbons and menus, write scripted tasks and execute scripts just by launching them from a URL call.

That?s extending Sitecore with PowerShell but what about PowerShell itself?

One of the coolest features introduced in 2.0 is the ability to write your own commandlets. Sure you could always use PowerShell to do it and write commandlets in script. But then the caveat was that you had to attach such commandlets to your own scripts (or put them in the initial script that would have to execute prior to the console). Now I?m talking about writing the real commandlets, just like those that come with the PowerShell console itself. Starting from 2.0 the console does not default to only attach commandlets that come with it, but can also scan other assemblies to attach your commandlets. To add your own all you have to do is well.. write them but then? all you have to do is to use the standard Sitecore include mechanism to enable the console to find them.

Including my own commandlets into Sitecore PowerShell Console

<configuration xmlns:patch="http://www.sitecore.net/xmlconfig/">
  <sitecore>
    <powershell>
      <commandlets>
	<add type="*, Cognifide.PowerShell" name="Cognifide_PowerShell_Commandlets" />
      </commandlets>
    </powershell>
  </sitecore>
</configuration>

Where the type parameter is just a regular Sitecore type reference with a slight twist ? you can use wildcards in it. So with the above example, the console will scan the Cognifide.PowerShell assembly and allow you to use all the commandlet classes that are tagged appropriately.

How to write a commandlet?

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While I?m updating it on a separate page I thought for the purpose of having a record and further tracking – it would be interesting to capture the state of the PowerShell knowledge in the Sitecore community here as well.

How do I get the PowerShell Console for Sitecore?

• Download the Console installation package from its Sitecore Shared Source page.
• Introductory documentation to PowerShell console on its Shared Source page.

Read the rest of this article »

Most of this post is also based on the Microsoft’s Windows PowerShell Quick Reference however despite the sharing scripting runtimes the nature of the both shells differ considerably as described in the previous post: Sitecore PowerShell Console cheat sheet – Part 1. In all cases where it made sense I’ve converted the samples to establish them in Sitecore scenarios.

How to Write Conditional Statements

To write an If statement use code similar to this:

$page = Get-item .;
$changedBy = $page."__Updated by";

if ($changedBy -eq "")
  { "Unspecified author - a system page?" }
elseif ($changedBy -eq $me)
  { "The page has been last edited by me!" }
else
  { "The page has been last edited by "+ $changedBy }

Instead of writing a series of If statements you can use a Switch statement, which is equivalent to VBScript’s Select Case statement:

$page = Get-Item .;
switch ($page.Language) {
    "en" {"This version is in English"}
    "pl" {"This version is in Polish"}
    "tlh-KX" {"This version is in Klingon?!"}
    default {"No idea what this language is!"}
  }

How to Write For and For Each Loops

Read the rest of this article »

Most of this post is also based on the Microsoft?s Windows PowerShell Quick Reference however despite the sharing scripting runtimes the nature of the both shells differ considerably as described in the previous post: Sitecore PowerShell Console cheat sheet ? Part 1. In all cases where it made sense I?ve converted the samples to establish them in Sitecore scenarios.

How to Write Conditional Statements

To write an If statement use code similar to this:

$page = Get-item .;
$changedBy = $page."__Updated by";

if ($changedBy -eq "")
  { "Unspecified author - a system page?" }
elseif ($changedBy -eq $me)
  { "The page has been last edited by me!" }
else
  { "The page has been last edited by "+ $changedBy }

Instead of writing a series of If statements you can use a Switch statement, which is equivalent to VBScript?s Select Case statement:

$page = Get-Item .;
switch ($page.Language) {
    "en" {"This version is in English"}
    "pl" {"This version is in Polish"}
    "tlh-KX" {"This version is in Klingon?!"}
    default {"No idea what this language is!"}
  }

How to Write For and For Each Loops

Read the rest of this article »

Most of this post is also based on the Microsoft?s Windows PowerShell Quick Reference however despite the sharing scripting runtimes the nature of the both shells differ considerably as described in the previous post: Sitecore PowerShell Console cheat sheet ? Part 1. In all cases where it made sense I?ve converted the samples to establish them in Sitecore scenarios.

How to Write Conditional Statements

To write an If statement use code similar to this:

$page = Get-item .;
$changedBy = $page."__Updated by";

if ($changedBy -eq "")
  { "Unspecified author - a system page?" }
elseif ($changedBy -eq $me)
  { "The page has been last edited by me!" }
else
  { "The page has been last edited by "+ $changedBy }

Instead of writing a series of If statements you can use a Switch statement, which is equivalent to VBScript?s Select Case statement:

$page = Get-Item .;
switch ($page.Language) {
    "en" {"This version is in English"}
    "pl" {"This version is in Polish"}
    "tlh-KX" {"This version is in Klingon?!"}
    default {"No idea what this language is!"}
  }

How to Write For and For Each Loops

Read the rest of this article »

I?m realizing time and time again that the learning curve for PowerShell can be steep without a proper guidance. While most people I talk to are very excited about the concept they become discouraged after a having some tries and not realizing its full potential. Therefore I decided it?s worth spending some time introducing some basic principles to help scripting alleviate some of the initial pains.

I have gathered some literature available for free about the topic of PowerShell in general you might want to read, but I also think that a distillation of the basic concepts is really important so you can have some quick wins while you begin your PowerShell journey.

A great deal of this post is a port of my older post for similar console for EPiServer, but since the differences are significant enough to confuse Sitecore developers if I sent them to the original version, I?ve decided to create a proper Sitecore cheat sheet.   Most of this is based on the Microsoft?s Windows PowerShell Quick Reference however despite the sharing scripting runtimes the nature of the both shells are pretty different (although the differences are not as vast as one might think).

That said, I considered that enough of the Reference document is irrelevant in the Sitecore scenario that it?s beneficial for the users of the console to have a bespoke cheat sheet created especially for the purpose of this plugin.

The content & samples of the original cheat sheet has been adjusted to more closely reflect scenarios usable for an Sitecore admin or developer.

How to get help

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.

Read the rest of this article »

I?m realizing time and time again that the learning curve for PowerShell can be steep without a proper guidance. While most people I talk to are very excited about the concept they become discouraged after a having some tries and not realizing its full potential. Therefore I decided it?s worth spending some time introducing some basic principles to help scripting alleviate some of the initial pains.

I have gathered some literature available for free about the topic of PowerShell in general you might want to read, but I also think that a distillation of the basic concepts is really important so you can have some quick wins while you begin your PowerShell journey.

A great deal of this post is a port of my older post for similar console for EPiServer, but since the differences are significant enough to confuse Sitecore developers if I sent them to the original version, I?ve decided to create a proper Sitecore cheat sheet.   Most of this is based on the Microsoft?s Windows PowerShell Quick Reference however despite the sharing scripting runtimes the nature of the both shells are pretty different (although the differences are not as vast as one might think).

That said, I considered that enough of the Reference document is irrelevant in the Sitecore scenario that it?s beneficial for the users of the console to have a bespoke cheat sheet created especially for the purpose of this plugin.

The content & samples of the original cheat sheet has been adjusted to more closely reflect scenarios usable for an Sitecore admin or developer.

How to get help

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.

Read the rest of this article »

I’m realizing time and time again that the learning curve for PowerShell can be steep without a proper guidance. While most people I talk to are very excited about the concept they become discouraged after a having some tries and not realizing its full potential. Therefore I decided it’s worth spending some time introducing some basic principles to help scripting alleviate some of the initial pains.

I have gathered some literature available for free about the topic of PowerShell in general you might want to read, but I also think that a distillation of the basic concepts is really important so you can have some quick wins while you begin your PowerShell journey.

A great deal of this post is a port of my older post for similar console for EPiServer, but since the differences are significant enough to confuse Sitecore developers if I sent them to the original version, I’ve decided to create a proper Sitecore cheat sheet.   Most of this is based on the Microsoft’s Windows PowerShell Quick Reference however despite the sharing scripting runtimes the nature of the both shells are pretty different (although the differences are not as vast as one might think).

That said, I considered that enough of the Reference document is irrelevant in the Sitecore scenario that it’s beneficial for the users of the console to have a bespoke cheat sheet created especially for the purpose of this plugin.

The content & samples of the original cheat sheet has been adjusted to more closely reflect scenarios usable for an Sitecore admin or developer.

How to get help

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.

Read the rest of this article »

Sitecore is built from the grounds up with extendibility in mind. Be that plugging into any place in its internal pipelines or any aspect of its User eXperience, therefore when I?ve managed to extend it?s context menu, I expected to have no problems whatsoever doing the same to its ribbon. Mind you I was right?

Using the PowerShell Console Module it took me less than 10 minutes total to add a nice piece of functionality that I thought was missing ? Publish items I have modified.

Similarly to extending context menu ? first I?ve created the script I wanted to execute that will take the current item and it?s sub-items and publish them by adding a new script item using the /sitecore/templates/Cognifide/PowerShell Script template in the core database. I?ve put it in the same place I store all my my scripts – in the /sitecore/content/Applications/PowerShell Console/Scripts branch but feel free to store them anywhere in the tree.

• Filled in the Script body part with my script.
• I decided I want to see the publishing results as I want to verify if the items I expected got published.

Now the UI integration bits?

Since I wanted it nicely integrated with the publish button – I?ve created a Publish My Items item of template /sitecore/templates/System/Menus/Menu item within the /sitecore/content/Applications/Content Editor/Menues/Publish/ branch in the core database, set it?s icon and reference the script item in the Message field using the following pattern:

item:executescript(id=$Target,script={0937769B-998D-4580-B9FE-730C4CDABECD},scriptDb=core)

where the script guid is the ID of your script and the scriptDb is the database the script is located in.

That?s it really. You can download the solution but I would strongly recommend you try the manual approach ? it?s really exciting to see the puzzles click in.

The solution requires the Sitecore PowerShell Console from Cognifide, available for free from Sitecore Shared Source site.

Find out about your configuration:

List your available site providers. You will use the name provided in the "Name" column in place of where I use "cms" in the later samples.

get-psdrive `
  | where-object { $_.Provider.ToString() -eq "CmsItemProvider"} `
  | format-table Name, Root

Sample scripts for working with pages:

For the same of brevity I?m assuming your location is already somewhere within a Sitecore tree (e.g. you did something akin to cd master:\content prior to executing the following scripts.

List all properties & fields available for a particular page (including Sitecore properties defined in the item template).

get-childitem | get-member -memberType property*

List all items in the CMS of which template name contains "Article"

get-childitem -recurse `
  | where-object { $_.TemplateName -match "Article" } `
  | format-table DisplayName, Name, TemplateName

List all subitems and how many days ago were they modified

get-childitem -recurse `
  | format-table -auto Name, `
  @{Label="Days since modified"; Expression={ `
  [datetime]::Now.Subtract($_.__Updated).Days} }

Delete all pages that have not been modified for the last 365 days.

get-childitem -recurse `
  | where-object {[datetime]::Now.Subtract($_.__Updated).Days -gt 365 } `
  | remove-item

List all items Updated over the last 24 hours and who changed them.

get-childitem -recurse `
  | where-object { $_.__Updated -gt [datetime]::Now.AddDays(-1) } `
  | format-table -property DisplayName, "__Updated By", {$_.Paths.Path}

List all pages that have their "Text" field filled in.

get-childitem -recurse `
  | where-object { $_.Text -ne $null } `
  | format-table -property DisplayName, {$_.Paths.Path}

Make a nice reviewer’s comment on all pages with their "Text" property filled in.

get-childitem -recurse `
  | where-object { $_.Text -ne $null } `
  | foreach-object { $_.ReviewersComment = "Great job providing content!" }

Add a warning to the beginning of "Text" property for all pages that have not been saved for the last 180 days.

get-childitem -recurse `
  | where-object {`
  [datetime]::Now.Subtract($_.__Updated).Days -ge 180 `
  -and $_.Text -ne $null }
  | foreach-object {$_.Text = "<p style='color:red'>Old content. Review pending!</p>" + $_.Text }

Replace a string in a property on all pages with another string (in this sample – removing the warning the last sample added).

$old_content = "<p style='color:red'>Old content. Review pending!</p>"
$new_content = "";
get-childitem -recurse `
  | where-object {$_.Text -match $old_content} `
  | foreach-object {$_.Text = $_.Text.Replace($old_content, $new_content) }

Display the 10 most recently changed pages ordered in the reverse chronological order or changes. Display the page name, who changed it and when as well as the page status.

get-childitem -recurse `
  | sort-object -property __Updated -descending `
  | select-object -First 10 `
  | format-table -property DisplayName, "__Updated By", __Updated

Sample scripts for working with Media Library / files:

Removes all .xml files from the ?Old Xml Files? in Media library.

cd "master:\media library\Old Xml Files"
get-childitem -recurse `
  | where-object { $_.Extension -match "xml" } `
  | remove-item

Copy all files from the "staging" folder to the "production" folder in Media Library.

Copying files within media library is done as follows. This can also be done for items in the content branch.

copy-item "master:\media library\staging\*" "master:\media library\production\"